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1909 






LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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ONE DAY AND ANOTHER 



ONE DAY AND 
ANOTHER 



BY 

E. V. LUCAS 



"the book of life, has wide margins: 
LEND ME A PENCIL." — Susanna s Haul 



NEW YORK 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

1909 






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7 



r 

CO 



PREFATORY NOTE 

T7IVE of these Essays appear for the first time. 
The others have been prmted^ although for 
the most part not quite as they now are^, in 
various periodicals. 



CONTENTS 



The Prosecutor 






PAGE 

I 


WiLLiAAr Allen Richardson 






10 


On Reading Aloud 






20 


For Love of England 






30 


The Traveller 






39 


The Sympathetic Whur 






44 


The Lord of Life . 






68 


A Confession 






11 


Simple Souls 






83 


The Dealer . 






T02 


"Ginnett's" 






114 


Dr. Blossom . 






120 


Other People's Books 






126 


The Enfranchised Reviewer 






131 


George Mariner 






145 


The Knocking at the Door 






152 


The Poet's Chairs . 






158 


The Perfect Widow 






164 


vi 









Contents 


vii 




PAGE 


Diana Shoal. .... 


182 


Winter Solace .... 


187 


A Rhapsodist at Lord's . 


199 


On a Bookseller's Mistake 


216 


Two Apologues 


225 


Studies in Consolation 


230 


The Cut-glass Bowl 


235 


The Collector .... 


250 



ONE DAY AND ANOTHER 
The Prosecutor ^:> o ^> ^:> ^p- 

T T is a hard thing to spend a large portion of 
one's life protesting that one will never figure 
in the role of a prosecutor^ and then one morning 
find one's self in the witness-box kissing a grubby 
Testament and sending a boy to prison. . . . 

I am not proud of it at all . . . 

But what is one to do when one is caught in 
the machinery of society ? And if a youth is a 
chronic pilferer at eighteen^ must he not be 
brought to his senses ? Is it not possible that 
what the magistrate calls a sharp lesson may be 
the means of pulling him round ? Let us think 
so. at any rate. 

One thing is certain^ and that is that a house 
in which some one is suspected of theft is very 
uncomfortable to live in. The air must be 
cleared. . . . 

At the police-station I was introduced to the 
resident detective. I had always thought of 

A I 



The Prosecutor 

detectives as sleuth-like and sinister^ with quick, 
decisive manners ; nor had I thought of them as 
residing at local police-stations, but as occupying 
offices at Scotland Yard, very difficult of access. 
Hence this smiling and affable, almost evangelical, 
young man filled me with surprise. He was, 
however, practical to the last syllable. ^^ I'll 
come up in the evening," he said, ^^and look 
round ; and then we 11 lay a trap." His face 
beamed as though he were giving out a hymn. 

Here was a hitch at the very start. Laying 
tra]:)s is not in my line at all. ^^ I don't want to 
prosecute, you must understand," I said; ^^ I 
only want to frighten the boy — if it is the boy — 
and give him another chance." ^'^ Then Ave can't 
help you," said the detective, very sadly, looking 
like a Y.M.C.A. secretary who has just received 
notice. '^ We can't touch it unless you mean to 
give him in charge " ; and he proceeded to 
develop a long argument, with duty-to-society 
and common-fairness-to-others as its motive. 

I went away unconvinced, but on discovering a 
further loss often shillings decided to let the law 
have its way. . . . 

Marking money is rather interesting. We did 
it very neatly, impressing a little die just under 
His Majesty's neck on two half-crowns, two 
florins, and one shilling. The detective, bathed 



The Trap 

in Christian joy^ drew a little hammer from his 
pocket for the purpose. Fancy always carrying 
a thing like that. 

He left me^ saying that the coins were to be 
placed in the purse in the usual place overnight^ 
and he would be round at nine the next morning. 

I went down to breakfast next mornings feeling 
quite certain that the purse would be intact^ and 
determined not to go on with the pursuit^ but 
merely to sack the boy ; but w hen I looked 
into it one half-crown and the shilling had 
gone. 

I assure you this was a very unpleasant moment. 
I ate no breakfast ; I felt as if I were to have a 
tooth out^ or even to be hanged by the neck until 
1 was dead. I smoked several cigarettes and 
waited for the detective. He came as nine was 
striking : as^ indeed^ I knew^ he would. He was 
smiling. My limbs shook as I told him. 

When he heard that two coins were gone his 
face so beamed with rapture that it seemed to 
diffuse light. ^^ Send for the boy/' he said^ ^'^and 
see that he does not throw away anything on the 
Avay up." I dragged my feet out of the room and 
called the boy as if I w ere his friend^ and wanted 
him^ as I often did^ to run upon an errand. 
(Judas!) He came promptly enough^ suspecting 
nothing. I avoided his eye. None the less^ he 

3 



The Prosecutor 

was eighteen^ and old enough to know better, con- 
found him ! 

The detective stated briefly that there had 
been many losses in the house, and two coins had 
been taken that morning, and there was reason to 
suspect him. He replied that he was perfectly 
honest and knew nothing of the matter. (Then 
who could it be } I wondered. Not the cook ? 
Never !) But the detective, who had no shame, 
said sternly, ^^Turn out your pockets." Fancy 
saying this after the boy had spoken up so 
frankly. It was horrible. The boy instantly 
complied, and I began to feel meaner than dirt. 
(What about the housemaid ? I thought.) The 
pockets were empty of money, but the detective 
showed no disappointment. ^^ Now take me 
downstairs to your overcoat," he said. 

I remained upstairs in agony. What an insult 
to the boy, I thought. In my house, too, w^here 
he was a kind of guest. Surely a case against me 
for defamation of character would hold, and be 
quite fair too. I tried to read the paper. . . . 

After a few minutes they came back. The 
detective irradiated triumph ; but the boy now 
avoided my eye, as I had once avoided his. ^^ It's 
all right,*' said the detective, meaning it was all 
wTong. ^^Show the gentleman," he said, *^ where 
you hid them"; and the boy showed me. He 
4 



Brotherhood 

had slipped the half-crown into his right boot and 
the shilling into his left. 

The scoundrel ! 

We went off in a cab to the police-station^ 
where I had to give him formally in charge. On 
the way the detective w^as quite affable with 
him ; all sense of the virtuous captor had vanished^ 
as though^ the arrest made^ he might relax 
into a brother again. At the station it was the 
same : the oflicers_, though firm and^ one felt^ 
inexorable, wxre very human. ''^ Come along, 
old man, and be measured/' one said to the boy : 
and that done, '^^ This w^ay, cockie," said another, 
and led him to the cells. 

The cells ! That made me feel bad again, but 
my tide of pity was arrested when I was shown 
twelve pawntickets which the boy had confessed 
related to articles that he had removed from the 
house. Twelve. 

Identifying one's own property at pawnshops 
is a seamy business. This boy had done things 
very well. He had secreted a pair of trousers 
one day and a razor the next, a bracelet^ another 
pair of trousers, another razor, a necklace, another 
razor, and we shall never know what else. By 
the irony of fate, he had stolen one of my razors 
— a new one — before I had paid for it, and so on 
the same day I had the humorous double duty of 

5 



The Prosecutor 

paying the barber five and six for it and the pawn- 
broker a shilHng. Of the pathetic disparity 
between the cost of my trousers and the sums 
which the boy's Uncle advanced^ I will say 
nothing. I will^ however^ record a point which 
caused me some surprise^ and that was the 
excessive politeness^ almost humility^ of the 
detective towards the pawnbrokers' assistants^ 
whom he addressed as ^^sir/' and whose willing- 
ness to display the pledged articles he craved 
rather tha,n demanded. It seems that pawn- 
brokers have it in their power to be very unhelpful 
to the police ; hence this diplomacy. It seems^ 
also^ that pawnbrokers do not lead the lives of 
luxury and ease which some of their nephew^s 
and nieces may have imagined^ for there is a police 
list published regularly containing particulars of 
stolen goods_, chiefly watches and jewellery^ which 
they are expected to know more or less by heart ; 
and if they lend money on a stolen watch and it 
is traced to them and reclaimed they are not 
recompensed. Strange into how many corners of 
life the serpent penetrates ! Strange^ also^ what 
odd events have to occur to put one in the w^ay of 
learning ! 

I attended the Court twice. My evidence was 
not required on the first occasion^ only the 
detective's ; and I sat in that evil place, in bad 

6 



The False Priest 

air_, and watched his halo grow as he gave it. 
The duties of the poHce, I thought, as I Ustened 
to him and to others of his kind, must be 
very harmful to the soul. It is impossible 
for these privileged men not to become self- 
righteous in their continuous role of the 
accuser of others. It is degrading to prosecute 
or be mixed up in prosecution. Few men can 
stand it. I will never prosecute again, I said. 

The other cases which w^ere in progress w^hile 1 
was waiting on the first occasion were unredeem- 
ably trumpery and squalid (like my own), but on 
the second occasion I was a listener to the 
remarkable disclosures made in the Treasury 
prosecution of a man whose (to me) bewildering 
offence was that he had forged names in order to 
persuade people that he w^as a clerk in Holy 
Orders. He did not seem to have dipped into 
crime — even to the theft of an archbishop's 
notepaper on which to write his testimonials to 
himself in the primatic hand — for the sake of the 
poor guinea which a locum earns, but because he 
had a genuine ambition to preach, and, I con- 
jecture, a genuine message of comfort to impart. 
He stood there, a poor broken man (he w^as a 
small printer by trade), while the list of his petty 
purloinings and mendacities grew longer and 
longer, and I wondered with what kind of an eye 

7 



The Prosecutor 

the Recording Angel views a man who has gone 
through so much human law- breaking in order to 
spread the glad tidings : for the prosperous^ 
ruddy clergyman from the country rectory^ whose 
guinea the felon had earned^ confessed cheer- 
fully that the trial sermon which he had heard him 
preach was admirable. ^^ Admirable/' he repeated^ 
in response to the Court's supple laughter^ and 
w^e all laughed again. 

There^ at any rate, I said to myself, is a sin 
which I must recollect as being high on the 
list of those I have no mind to, to compound with 
when I want to commit another lying nearer my 
heart. I can see myself in the dock for a good 
few outrages against the laws which man has 
made, but never for falsely representing myself 
to be a clerk in Holy Orders. 

A few minutes after the pseudo-curate had 
slipped down on remand (he received his sentence 
a week later) I had to give my evidence. 

The form of religion in which I was brought up 
directs that I should not swear, but affirm, and 
hitherto, in making affidavits, I have obeyed it. 
But I could not bring myself to put so much 
unusual machinery in motion against this wretched 
boy. It seemed too great an affectation of 
honesty on my part — especially as I had been 
remembering that, when I was ten or thereabouts. 



Outraged Guilt 

1 stole a pair of boots from the boot cupboard at 
home and sold them for eighteenpence to buy a 
brass cannon. I therefore kissed the Testament 
like any other perjurer and told my squalid tale 
of infringed rights of property. 

-' Have you any questions to ask the prosecutor ? " 
the magistrate asked. ^^ No/' said the boy^ who 
had never looked at me once. Suppose he had 
known about the boots ! I drew a deep breath of 
relief and stepped down. 

Two months with hard labour. 

I will never prosecute again. 



William Allen Richardson .^ <:> <:> 

AT THO was William Allen Richardson? I ask 
once again^ as once again I look through 
a florist's list. Can no one answer this question ? 
No one has done so yet^ though I have put it 
to ladies with secateurs in their hands and to 
gentlemen mixing soft soap against the verdant 
but vicious aphis ; to otherwise most imparting 
of representatives of famous horticultural firms 
beneath sweltering canvas at the Temple ; and 
once to a talkative expert in the Wisley paradise 
that belongs to the R.H.S. But all in vain ! 
Perhaps they thought that^ like Pilate similarly 
in need of information^ I was jesting — a suspicion 
under which one almost naturally lies if one 
asks any question out of the groove ; but indeed 
I was not^ I am not. Who was W^illiam Allen 
Richardson ? I inquire in all earnestness. 

Meanwhile^ as^ in the manner of a candidate 
who has put a poser to his meetings I pause 

lO 



New Names and Old 

for a reply^ I would remark that this same 
florist's hst forces one again to reaUse sadly 
that the new names are not the equal of the 
old. These are some of the new names : Colonel 
S. R. Williamson^ Countess of Gosford^ Mrs. A. 
M. Kirker^ Dorothy Page Roberts^ Madame J. 
W. Budde^ Madame Leonie Noisy^ Marichu 
Zazas^ Mrs. Peter Blair^ Mrs. Baron Ward^ Nance 
Christy, William Shean, Nellie Johnstone, Le 
Droit Humain, Mrs. O. C. Orpen, and Anny 
Muller : good names in their way, but far from 
competing with some of the old, with Abel 
Carriere and Alfred Colomb, with Camille 
Bernardin and Dupuy Jamain, with Llrich 
Brunner and La France, with Gloire de Dijon 
and Gustave Regis, or with Papa Gontier and 
Mrs. Sharman Crawford. Yet time and usage 
do wonders, it is true, and it is more than likely 
that, had I been writing in 1878, when William 
Allen Richardson was new, I should have pro- 
tested against that name, little thinking that it 
was to become a household word. (By the way, 
who was William Allen Richardson ?) And yet 
there is a fine fulness about that name which few, 
if any, of these new roses bear. William Sliean 
— is William Shean ever likely to pass into the 
language ? Or Harry Kirk ? I do not like that 
Harry at all. I have, indeed, a doubt as to 
II 



William Allen Richardson 

^vllether men should ever be named Harry : 
certainly not roses. I do not like roses to have 
familiar diminutives. Who would say Dolly 
Perkins? Nance Christy is prettier (" a magnifi- 
cent grower ; large semi - double flowers of a 
most delicate shade of salmon-pink; very free 
blooming/' also ^^ very vig.") ; but do you see her 
as a household name ? 

It seems to me that English rose-growers 
choose their names on a faulty principle. They 
wish to compliment a friend^ a customer^ an 
illustrious man ; and the result is that when this 
person has an ugly name the rose has an ugly 
name too. It is true that a rose by any other 
name would smell as sweet ; and yet it is not 
all true. It is what the rose-grower might call 
a ^^semi-double" truth: for there is much in a 
name^ and roses should have names worthy of 
them. A rose with an ugly name does not 
smell as sweet — at any rate^ on paper — as a rose 
with a beautiful name. That is why I hold that 
a rose-grower who has devised a new rose should 
wish to compliment not a person but the rose. 

He should choose the most beautiful name he 
can. Accident, especially in France, has now 
and then seen to it that the name of the person 
honoured was as beautiful as it could be, such 
as Dupuy Jamain and Madame Eugene Verdier 

12 



Meredith Roses 

and General Jacqueminot and Maurice Bernardin_, 
and (in a homelier^ merrier way) Dorothy 
Perkins ; but that is exceptional. Most often 
it happens that the name is ugly^ as I hold 
many of the new names to be. A rose should 
have a name as immortal as itself. The Earl 
of Penzance knew this when he called his 
sw^eet-briars after Scott's heroines. Shakespeare, 
so far as England is concerned, might give 
names to all our new roses. Think of the 
Hermione and the Juliet ! What a name for a 
climbing rose — Romeo ! After Shakespeare, Mr. 
Meredith. The Clara Middle ton, the Diana, the 
Natalie, and the Sandra Belloni. Better than 
choosing rose-grower's wives and aunts, at any 
rate in England, where the rose-growers have 
(no fault of theirs) commonplace names. They 
order these things better in France, M. Nabonnand 
having the good fortune to own not only such 
a fine surname, but a female relative Noella. 
Hence the Noella Nabonnand. Again, take the 
Verdiers, Eugene and Victor, and Etienne Levet, 
and Dupuy Jamain, and Jules Margottin — all 
French rose-growxrs ; and then think of our 
excellent but monosyllabic Cant and Paul, our 
Dickson and McGredy. The Frenchmen have 
it ; Waterloo is avenged. 

It is interesting to see how recent the best 
13 



William Allen Richardson 

roses are. Even such a time-honoured friend as 
the Gloire de Dijon (or the Old Glory^ as the 
wise cottagers call it) goes back no further than 
1853; the Marechal Niel was created in 1864; 
Camille Eernardin in 1865; Dupuy Jamain in 
1868 ; Frau Karl Druschki^ perhaps the most 
beautiful of all the recent roses^ in 1900 ; 
General Jacqueminot in 1853 ; Madame Eugene 
Verdier in 1878^ and her Souvenir, compliment 
of another and rival firm (the gallant French 
rose-growers!)^ in 1895; Mrs. R. G. Sharman 
Crawford in 1894 ; Prince Camille de Rohan 
(the poem!) in 186l ; Ulrich Brunner in 1881; 
Gruss an Teplitz (known irreverently in one 
family with which I am unhappily acquainted 
as Gruesome Triplets) in 1897 ; Gustave Regis 
in 1890 ; the lovely La France (lovely rose and 
lovely name !) in 1867 ; Papa Gontier (the merry 
white-haired courtly old gentleman!) in 1883; 
Papa Lambert in 1899 ; Maman Cochet (the 
old darling!) in 1893, White Maman Cochet 
in 1897; the Crimson Rambler in 1893; and 
the Niphetos_, earliest of all_, in 1844. 

Who were they all, these French ladies and 
gentlemen ? I think some one ought to tell us ; 
we want a Roses' Who's Who. Papa Gontier : 
who was he ? But most of all do I want to 
know who was William Allen Richardson.^ In 
14 



1878 

addition to gardeners amateur and professional^ 
I have asked many persons_, but none know. I 
have asked encyclopaedic men who have at their 
tongues' end facts and even statistics : men w^ho 
know what the Oblate Fathers are^ and the best 
restaurant in Vienna^ and the family names of all 
the dukes ; but none of them can tell me. I 
have asked w^riters of leading articles. I ha\ie 
asked barristers^ who notoriously know all ; but 
in vain. 

Was he a florist^ or an American senator^ or 
merely a rose-growing gentleman } The name 
has an Irish smack : at least the only Aliens 
and the only Richardsons I ever knew personally 
w ere alike Irish. Is he alive to-day ? He might 
easily be^ for the rose bearing his name dates 
only from 1878 — thirty-one years ago. If 
William Allen Richardson were then^ say^ forty, 
he would still be only seventy. How odd to 
meet him in real life ! " Allow me to introduce 
you to Mr. William Allen Richardson." ^^Not 
the William Allen Richardson ? " you would reply 
in an awed whisper. 

In speculating as to his character, one has 
to bear in mind that the rose-grower who 
gave him his immortality was a Frenchman, 
M. Ducher. It is very unusual for a French 
grower to honour a foreigner. What was 
15 



William Allen Richardson 

William Allen Richardson's special claim upon 
M. Ducher ? Will no one tell me ? 

Apropos of the dates of the famous roses^ they 
are nearly all in the lifetime of a sexagenarian^ 
while an octogeranium^ as the late Dean Hole^ 
who was honoured by one rose in 1873 and 
another in 1904, once called himself^ could easily 
remember the time when roses were just roses^. 
as I imagine they were before names came in. 

And pelargoniums. Who decides that a pelar^ 
gonium.that is ^^ glowing-scarlet^ with a large white 
blotch on the two upper petals^ the centre suffused 
with rich carmine^ very vivid in colouring, and fine 
in form/' shall be called after Mr. Andrew Lang } 
It is a long way from brindled hair, isn't it ? 
^' Bright cerise, surpassing all previous kinds in 
their colours, being the largest bloom of any, 3 in. 
across each flower." What author does that 
suggest ? It speaks for itself. Mr. J. M. Barrie^ 
of course. And for whom is the flower named 
that is ^' in every way an improvement upon 
Henri Jacoby".^ King Edward vii. One has 
heard many compliments passed upon His 
Majesty, but never one so sweeping and satis- 
factory as this — ^* in every way an improvement 
upon Henri Jacoby." Incidentally it shows us 
also how short the life of a new pelargonium 
can be. Next year there may be (perish the 
i6 



Mr. Kipling 

thought !) an improvement in every way upon 
King Edward vii.^ or, on the other hand, the 
King Edward vii. may continue to be one of 
the best glowing- crimson white-stalked pelar- 
goniums for a century or more. 

For whom is this flower named — ^^ Rich, 
very dark crimson-purple, with glowing-crimson 
blotch at the base of the upper petals ? " Can 
you hesitate ? Mr. Rudyard Kipling. The author 
of Kim, however, if he wished to indulge in the 
sweet flattery of a name-garden would not need 
to confine its blossoms to pelargoniums, for I find 
him again as a tree peony — ^^ A fine maroon 
crimson flower" — and no doubt he has name- 
flowers in many other lists too. But I suppose 
that after, perhaps, royalty, the largest name- 
garden would be that of Mr. William Robinson 
of Gravetye, who had been the chief guardian 
angel of gardeners for many years before many of 
the new counsellors were born. 

Coming to delphiniums in the catalogue that 
lies before me at this moment — a magnificent 
quarto work of 370 pages, copiously embellished 
(as the old title-pages used to say) with pictures 
of beautiful examples of free-flowering vegetation, 
sections of herbaceous borders that it is im- 
possible to look at and remain calm, and now 
and then a richly-coloured plate — coming to del- 
B 17 



William Allen Richardson 

phiniums^ we fird some cricketers. Lord Hawke 
is ^^ violet and plum colour with a small white 
eye'* (like a Kaffir); Mr. A. C. MacLaren^ on 
the contrary^ has a black eye ; the Hon. F. S. 
Jackson follows Lord Hawke and favours a white 
eye ; while Sir Spencer Ponsonby-Fane, who if 
no cricketer to-day was a great cricketer once and 
knows more about the game than any living man^ 
is credited with no eye at all : nothing but a 
^^ broad purple patch." 

Another question that occurs to one is this — 
Do the flowers ever disappear under one name 
and reappear under another } I ask this because 
I notice that in the excitement of the moment 
certain varieties have received intensely topical 
names. Thus there is a double peony called 
Lottie Collins. It is a far cry from the hectic 
inebriety of Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay to the cool and 
dewy petals of a double peony. But florists can 
bridge these gulfs in an instant. 

These floral catalogues have this advantage 
over the booksellers'^ that the good things picked 
out are always available to the purchasing reader^ 
whereas the books that one wants are too often 
sold. No need to telegraph for an Andrew Lang 
pelargonium — there are plenty for all. 

Did you know that flowers were reviewed ? It 
is so. In the catalogue before me certain phrases 
i8 



An Epicurean 

are printed below them^ just as if they were Mr. 
Hewlett's novels or essays by Mr. Benson. For in- 
stance^ of the Lady Beresford peony The Gardener s 
M-agazine says^ '' A magnificent bloom " ; while 
upon Sir Thomas Lipton The Gardening World 
passes this generous and warm-hearted opinion : 
" A huge double bright rosy-carmine flower of 
great merit.'' Now here is a new and delightful 
profession for a reviewer who (like myself) is 
tired of books. Let him change for a while and 
become a reviewer of flowers. I offer myself as a 
reviewer of flowers to any editor in need of one. 

Meanwhile I cannot get out of my head the 
sentiment that I overheard in the Charing Cross 
Road as I was recently passing down it. Two men 
were talking^ and apparently one had said some- 
thing illustrating his enthusisasm for his garden 
in the suburbs^ to which he was looking forward to 
hurrying back by an afternoon train. The other 
was not like that. ^^ My idea of a garden/' he 
said in a loud voice as they went by, ^^ is a place 
to lay down in." 

How different we all are, and how good that it 
is so ! But I wish some one could tell me who 
William Allen Richardson was. 



19 



On Reading Aloud .^ <o ^> .^^ 

^T THILE talking a little while since to a 
literary man of eminence whose foible it 
is to play the garrulous autobiographer in mixed 
company^ he grumbled to me that one of his 
recent hosts in the country had the detestable 
habit of reading aloud in the evening, to the ruin 
of good talk. I can conceive of Dr. Johnson 
uttering a similar complaint, with a blunter dogma- 
tism, and this naturally causes one to examine the 
situation more closely, because of the suspicion 
at the back of one's mind that the Doctor was 
never wrong ; and yet none the less my own 
feeling is that I should like to stay in such a 
house. For some of the pleasantest memories I 
shall ever have are connected with reading aloud, 
and so little do I think the habit detestable that 
I once meditated bringing together in one book 
a collection of extracts suitable for reading aloud 
at odd times, for the use of those derelicts (like 
20 



A Beguiler of Youth 

myself) who like to be lulled by the human voice. 
As a child I heard much of Dickens in this way^ 
all Jacob Abbott (whom I adored)^ Ruskin's 
King of the Golden River, together with a host of 
stories which I have since discovered had little 
charm of their own^ but which read in those 
gentle tones — in that sweet monotony — were 
more fascinating than any of the music to which 
one's adult ears have listened. 

I hope that reading aloud will continue to be 
encouraged in schools^ against the revival of 
interest in it that the swing of the pendulum 
should ensure. My own schooldays in several 
establishments w^ere sweetened by it^ although 
the example of the master who was most addicted 
to this pleasant art may be held to have been 
a little dangerous. He was a handsome and (I 
now conjecture) profligate Scotchman^ with a 
world's record for some athletic feat — I think for 
throwing the hammer — and a tendency to be on 
sponging terms with the older boys and frankly 
piratical terms with the younger^ for he still 
possesses (or at least I do not) a silver pencil of 
mine to which he took a fancy. What branch of 
learning he had under his control^ I forget 
completely^ but what I can remember_, with 
minute fidelity, is the entertainment that he 
substituted for it ; for it was his genial and 



On Reading Aloud 

popular habit to place beneath the text-book 
from which he should have instructed us — and 
indeed did affect to instruct us when any 
authority or a messenger from another class-room 
entered — either a play of Shakespeare or a novel 
of Ouida (his two authors)^ from one of which he 
read to us with fine feeling so long as the coast 
was clear. He was a born reader, his only fault 
being that he felt too much, and I can still see 
the tears streaming down his face over A Leaf in 
the Storm and A Dog of Flanders, and other pathetic 
histories by that generous romantic creature, 
now cold, who in the seventies was perused from 
the Thames to Tokio, wherever Englishmen 
assembled. 

I wonder where you are now, sir ? You may 
keep my pencil. 

Later, it was my fortune — reading aloud being 
still a cultivated art — to hear both the brave 
and spirited Brand ram and the wistful Clifford 
Harrison. I look round among the entertainers 
to-day for any who compensates us for the loss of 
Brandram or gives anything as good. That 
brisk, tense, grey little man alone at his 
desk reading Shakespeare or Dickens could 
be as arresting as an actor with -all the 
advantages of stage illusion. I was born too 
late to hear Dickens in person, but I once 

22 



The Ironical Authors 

heard his son^ who^ however^ came far behmd 
Brandram. Will authors ever again read their 
works in public ? Will there ever more be 
penny readings ? I had the idea a few years 
ago of trying to induce a comedian to read 
Mr. Dooley in a music hall^ just as an experi- 
ment, but no one thought anything of the 
project. 

It is perhaps a little alarming for me to say 
so much of the professionals — the readers who 
are not ashamed either of displaying emotion 
or of rising to the innocent falsetto in which 
Brandram used to pitch the remarks of Master 
Harry Walmers junior in the story of Boots at 
the Holly-Tree Inn. For the reading aloud that 
really counts is such reading as so exasperated 
my friend the autobiographer when he w^as 
staying in the country and wanted to talk : 
reading by readers who have no dramatic gift 
whatever, intelligent humorous persons of kindly 
nature (this of course goes with the art) without 
vocal modulation or mimicry. For such the 
ironical authors are the best. Arnold, for 
example, in Fnendshiii s Garland, which reads 
aloud wonderfully, or that essay by him on America 
that appeared in the Nineteenth Century in the 
month in which he died, and has, I believe, 
never been republished, possibly out of considera- 
23 



On Reading Aloud 

tion (surely an over-sensitiveness) for the feelings 
of the nation under the switch. If any one wants 
an agreeable half-hour let him procure that 
number of the Nineteenth Century and turn to 
an article entitled '^ Civilization in the United 
States/' and having mastered it^ let him then 
read it aloud to a congenial company. Bagehot 
is almost everywhere good to read aloud, but for 
a trial trip begin with his diverting account of 
Crabb Robinson. Leslie Stephen in places could 
not be better, but too much did he control his 
mischief. Gibbon goes admirably for a while, 
but monotony is soon inevitable from the see- 
saw symmetry of his sentences. Goldsmith is 
always good. Heine's prose in Leland's transla- 
tion is easy to the unemotional reader, and of 
course immensely diverting and awakening. 
Hazlitt reads aloud almost as w^ell as any man ; 
but to read Lamb aloud is a mistake — you want 
your eye on the w^ords and the punctuation. An 
intermediary breaks the chain. Cowper's letters 
are perfect. 

Other good books for the undramatic reader 
that occur to me — and there is little point in 
suggesting material for the others, since their 
gifts can re-create anything : and is not all Dickens 
to hand, never to be exhausted, and Thackeray, 
and Mr. Hardy (but not Mr. Meredith: let no one 
24 



Quiet Humorists 

think to obtain him vicariously ! ), and the ador- 
able W. W. Jacobs^ and the Misses Somerville 
and Ross ? — but^ as I say^ there is no need to 
name the writers that require from the reader 
something of the actor's treatment. Among 
other good books for the reader with but one 
voice and one manner^ and no desire for creation, 
1 would name Stevenson's Fables and Dr. Garnett's 
stories in The Tivilight of ihe Gods, particularly that 
little masterpiece^ beyond (I think) even Anatole 
France^ entitled Abdallah the Adite, and Mr. White- 
ing's early satire The Island, and a book of 
genuine stealthy fun that was published some 
ten years ago under the title The Wallet of Kai 
Lung, in which irresistible use is made of the 
mechanism of Chinese courtesy by an author 
possessed of true humour. 

I would also place very high the Memoirs of 
Alexandre Dumas^ the fun of which — the double 
fun of which^ the fun of the adventures and 
experiences and eccentricities of the narrative 
-and the fun of the naivete of the tremendous 
narrator — can be fully appreciated only in com- 
mittee^ so to speak, ricochetting from reader to 
hsteners and listeners to reader. 

Of this great and diverting work I find it 
difficult to speak calmly. It is a kind of library 
rather than a book, and indeed there are six 

25 



On Reading Aloud 

volumes of it in Mrs. Waller's translation — ^just a 
million words. 

An amusing literary game that is periodically 
played by the gossips in the dull season is the 
collection of views as to the best books for a 
desert island. It is more than likely that could 
a desert island fall happily to any of us, the 
principal discovery that we should make would 
be that reading is preceded on the roll of pas- 
times or occupations by a thousand superior 
allurements ; but it pleases us to assume that we 
should carry our home habits with us even to the 
remotest Pacific, and hence this occasional com- 
pilation, which never fails to begin with Boswell, 
and usually comprises also Gibbon and Montaigne. 
I refer to the matter merely because the best 
book for a desert island is Dum.as' Memoirs. It is 
the best book for a desert island for various 
reasons that may as well be tabulated — («) it is 
so long that by the time the end was reached 
either a ship would have arrived or the beginning 
would be fresh again ; (6) it does not matter 
where you take it up — one page is as good as 
another, if not better ; (c) it requires on the part 
of the reader no intellectual activity, a plant 
probably of slow growth amid the tropical luxuries 
of South Sea isolation ; and (d) — and this should 
of course be (a) — Dumas wrote it. 
26 



The Great Dumas 

The worst charge that any enemy of Dumas 
(but he has none now) could bring against it is 
that it is often untruthful. But even that charge 
would be unfair. Untruthful is the wrong word. 
The great Alexandre was never untruthful ; he 
was merely Dumas. There is truth abstract^ and 
truth Dumasian^ and he told the truth Dumasian 
consistently. This book^ indeed^ being from 
Dumas' hand alone^ unassisted by Maquet or 
other ghost^ is^ with Mes Betes, the best example 
of sustained Dumasian truth-telling that w^e have^ 
and it cannot be overpraised. (^Mes Betes, by the 
way^ which in English is Mt/ Dogs, would also 
read aloud entertainingly.) 

It is a kind of impertinence and profanation to 
praise the Memoii^s at all. In Mr. Chesterton's 
monograph on Dickens — who^ by the way^ had 
the opportunity once to meet Dumas romantically 
in Paris at midnight^ but failed to keep tryst (as^ 
remarks Mr. Lang in his introduction^ Stevenson 
would have done) — in Mr. Chesterton's mono- 
graph on Dickens, he says somewhere that it is 
absurd to refer to Dickens's novels as novels : they 
are just lengths of varying size cut off a vast roll 
of material that is Dickens. Dumas' Memoirs 
appear to me with far more conviction to be a 
vast roll of material that is Dumas. Dickens, at 
least, was a creator of a new world ; but Dumas 
27 



On Reading Aloud 

merely takes the world with which we are 
familiar and makes himself its axis, or I might 
rather say its sun : and then hands us a pair of 
golden spectacles with which to contemplate the 
comedy. And the fun never flags : it may 
descend occasionally into regret, or tragedy, or 
pathos ; but the writer recovers himself instantly, 
brushes away his tears with a laugh, and is again 
the great, the generous, the humane ; again the 
darling of the gods, the incorrigible romantic, 
the arch-artist in rencontres, the most fascinating 
egotist that the world has known. 

On seconds thoughts I consider Dumas' 
Memoirs to be quite the least suitable of all 
books for reading on a desert island, because 
every word of it is an invitation — more, a 
trumpet call — to the reader to give up isolation 
and narrow boundaries and enter the crowded 
world of men (and women) as an epicure of life, 
a knight-errant of civilisation, a romantic ad- 
venturer. One page of this glorious glutton of 
experiences would poison the air of a desert island 
for ever. Across the wastes of water would come 
the disquieting alluring murmur of lighted cities ; 
into the narcotic spicy breath of the evening 
would w^aft the disturbing fragrance of a Parisian 
charcoal fire. And what then ? There would 
be nothing for it but to build a raft and go. No ; 
28 



A Saint 

Dumas' Memoirs is the last book to give to a 
desert islander^ but it is a very perfect work 
for the reader aloud in good company. 

And what of that reader ? Ah^ there^ I think^ 
we touch upon great virtue. If I were the Re- 
cording Angel I would be very gentle with readers 
aloud^ whatever they had done at other times : 
not only from a general admiration of their 
kindness^ but from my own particular private 
horror of the suffering which my own reading 
aloud costs me. It makes me hoarse^ it makes me 
sleepy beyond drugs_, and it twists my tongue, 
after a little, more than anything ever sung by 
Mr. Wilkie Bard. And, lacking the needful 
power of seeing two lines ahead (as John 
Roberts used to see two cannons ahead), I am 
continually falling into wrong stresses and mis- 
understandings which annoy me like little stings. 
But the intense physical weariness which read- 
ing aloud produces — the yawns and the irritations 
— this is often so bad that I never reach the late 
stages at all. It is therefore that I cherish a 
veneration for the patient untiring reader aloud 
which I am unable fittingly to express. 



29 



For Love of England <-> ^::> ^;> 

A MONG recent English nov els which any 
domestic reader may read to his friends 
and be never put to the shame of mountebanking^ 
I would recommend a tender and fragrant little 
fantasy that very few^ persons seem to know, 
entitled Dagonet the Jester, by the ill-fated 
Malcolm Kingsley Macmillan. 

Dagonet the Jester is the story of the Fool^, or 
Jester, of my Lord Sandiacre ; of the offence he 
gave to my Lady and consequent expulsion from 
the great house ; of his settlement in the village 
of Thorn Abbey as a cobbler ; of his marriage to 
Nancy of the inn ; of Nancy's change from ripe 
gaiety to seriousness ; and of the bitter end their 
marriage had, by reason of the irreconcilability of 
their temperaments — he being a child of nature, 
free of word and deed, untroubled byself-searchings 
and misgivings, void of offence ; and she, though 
not less void of offence, fearful of impulse, anxious 
30 



" Dagonet the Jester " 

for her soul's good and his, a Puritan at 
heart. 

The period of the story is early Stuart, the border 
line of time dividing Merrie England on the one 
side and our own conscience-stricken England 
on the other, and the historian is Master Aaron 
Blenkinsop, a boy of Dagonet's village, and the 
son of his best friend. Mistress Blenkinsop, and 
one w^ho, coming under the patronage of the 
Sandiacres, grew to be a man of learning and a 
satirical wit, with a large measure of that inde- 
finable quality which we call charm. 

It is a delicate, kindly fancy, touched with 
gentle communicative melancholy, and therefore, 
since the method of the narrative is retrospective, 
quietly reminiscent, very easy to the reader 
aloud. The tints are low and faint, and sugges- 
tion is more than statement. For those w^ho 
would choose to be whispered to rather than 
shouted at, Dagonet's story should have fascina- 
tion. 

The title, truly, is a little misleading. When we 
see Jester on the cover of a book we expect fun ; 
or, as in the case of Chicot, adventures ; while 
Sunday journalism has given to the name of 
Dagonet a connotation which certainly breaks 
down here. For our Dagonet offers more tears than 
laughter. He is not the rich man's Jester or Fool 
31 



For Love of England 

as, outside Shakespeare (whose Fools are not the 
least radiant jewels in his crown of glory), he is 
understood in English literature ; he rises head 
and shoulders above these. This Dagonet is of 
the greatest, owning kinship with the fool in Lear 
himself. His was that folly that lies nearest 
wisdom. Perhaps a better name for it is unprac- 
ticalness informed by wit, the negation of the 
trick of ^^gettmg on." The truest, gayest artists 
have it. Dagonet himself was an artist, in a day 
when men could be artists and know no one to 
tell them of it. 

Lady Sandiacre, being a vain woman blinded 
by conceit, missed Dagonet's rectifying smile 
when one night he offered her a quip, and he was 
straightw^ay led to the confines of the park by 
her docile and disenchanted lord, who, with tears 
in his eyes, bade the Fool farewell. At this 
point the story opens. Dagonet settled down in 
the neighbouring village to cobble and be as 
merry as God willed amid the insidious begin- 
nings of Puritanism. He lodged with the 
blacksmith Blenkinsop and Mistress Blenkinsop, 
the mother of Aaron, who tells the tale ; and 
Mistress Blenkinsop that morning sent to the 
^' George " for a flagon of Burgundy for breakfast, 
*^ wishing, as she said, to let Master Dagonet 
down easily from that high estate to which he 



Mistress Blenkinsop 

had been used." This Mistress Blenkinsop is a 
notable figure. '^ Dagonet/' said Aaron later^ 
^^ was born into a world which left confession to 
the parson. Much of his life w^as lived before 
every man was fain to be considered a priest^ and 
when even the priest could look with smiling on 
May games and May blossoms. My mother was 
another such forest changelings and minded her^ 
as Dagonet doth stilly of the green and growing 
earthy though my father could see nothing but 
the blackness of the Ironsides' empire between 
our tender lives and the avenging fires of God." 

Thus, we find Dagonet suffering not alone from 
the invasion of conscience. Mistress Blenkinsop 
breathed the same air ; she, too, was nigh 
Nature's heart. Fiction is rich in good mothers, 
but few have more charm than this winsome 
dame. Yet too much even for her, with her 
indomitable spirit and sense, was the seriousness 
setting in at that time, and she, too, became 
troubled in mind and lost her gaiety. With her 
death the first part of the book, made valuable 
chiefly by her share in it, closes. 

In the second part, twelve years later, we find 
s. new Lord Sandiacre, young and foolish, with 
Aaron as his secretary. The scene opens with 
the return of my Lord to his home. He paused 
at the ^^ George " for liquor, w^hich was brought 
C .33 



For Love of England 

to him by the other woman of the story, Nancy 
Cotes, " that beautiful whirlwind/' as Aaron calls 
her. '^ When my Lord dismounted she strode up 
and threw one arm over his horse's neck, looking 
at us all with a kind of reckless defiance." My 
Lord was struck, and Dagonet, standing by, saw 
it. It was perhaps with a view to her protection 
that a few days later Dagonet and Nancy were 
married ; and with that step came the beginning 
of the end. Dagonet was not for the fetters of 
marriage^ nor had Nancy enough breadth of mind 
to admit so elvish a nature as her husband's. 
The Jester was the soul of kindness, but Nancy 
grew daily more anxious and less and less the 
beautiful whirlwind. The potentialities of that 
day when she brought the drinking-cup to 
the young lord and met his eyes with gaze of 
equal frankness dwelt with her. The Calvinistic 
preacher was abroad, damnation was in the air, 
and weak vessels who had not sinned imagined 
sins with which to torture themselves. She was 
another of Puritanism's victims. 

In such an atmosphere Dagonet languished 
and grew faint ; moreover, his popularity in the 
village had gone, he was eyed askance. Scandal 
was talked of him. Wit was in bad odour, 
gaiety in worse. Dagonet, Nancy complained, 
could do nothing for her soul. He could not 
34 



A Domestic Idyll 

see. She wished to convince him of her love, 
but also of her unv^orthiness, and he would not 
understand. ^^ He only pats and strokes me 
with ^ Good child ! good child I I do most 
exceedingly love thee. And what a heart is 
thine too, Nanny ! Be merry and love me as 
thou canst/ " Aaron's last glimpse of husband 
and wife together was one cold evening when 
Nancy's mood was for the moment gay almost as 
of old. ^^ Looking in I saw through the cloud 
of smoke a most singular scene. With his back 
to me, and dressed in his old jester's suit, sat 
Dagonet, the married cobbler, drinking in 
tobacco, and making sharp strokes in the air 
with his bauble. Facing me, with a window- 
sill at her right hand, where were set holly- 
boughs and yew-twigs in a rich confusion, sat 
Nancy his wife. She had just been giving suck 
to her little boy, and her right breast shone 
through the firelight and blue smoke like a 
sea-foam of a creamy gold, blown suddenly into 
a glorious orb, and touching the sea-floor like 
another sun." ^^Be merry, little knave," Dagonet 
was saying to his son, '' but take to thee early 
the garment of wisdom and the mask of gravity" ; 
and then Nancy produced from a secret place a 
little suit of motley for the child, and all were 
as merry as larks. But of a sudden Nancy's 
35 



For Love of England 

mood changed and she became sober again^ and 
called for a truce to gaiety. It was Dagonet's 
last trial. He rose and slipped softly out with 
a bundle in his arms^ while Nancy turned to 
the study of Ezekiel. 

^^I go to take the air/' Dagonet said^ ^^and 
spell out on the gravestones the names of some 
of my dead cronies." Some while later a 
suspicion came upon Nancy and Aaron that all 
was not well^ and they set out to look for their 
friend. They sought in vain ; but meeting with 
one Jock learned that he had but half an hour 
since talked with the Fool in the churchyard. 
He carried a torch and was reading the names 
on the stones. ^^ Oh^ for the goodly company 
of my friends who lie below/' he had said — 
^* Master Blenkinsop and his wife. . . . There 
will be no such cronies for me again. They 
reminded me never of my dishonour. And they 
who are left can think of nothing else." Dagonet 
was never seen alive again. They found him 
dead against Mistress Blenkinsop's tomb. 

If you like to read a deeper meaning into the 
story you may. Tiie author^ indeed^ helps you 
to it. In the transformed Nancy^ so debonair 
by nature^ so free and frank in her youth^ and 
latterly so conscious of her soul's danger and 
.so timorous of spontaneity^ vou may discover 

36 



Live and Let Live 

the beginnings of that morbid desire for safety 
in the after-Ufe from which so many have since 
suffered. ^^ The conscience - stricken plaining 
mother at my side/' said the observant Aaron, 
^^was a type of the new woman, in whom the 
sense of sin was to be the predominant featm'e." 
And again, at the end : ^' For I think ever of 
the sap of the merry greenwood and the life- 
streams of England's wanton revelry frozen 
suddenly in Dagonet's beloved form." We may, 
indeed, if we like, consider Dagonet the Jester 
its author's protest against a world whose atmo- 
sphere is too bitter for the genial soul of the 
artist. 

Many a writer has come to this conclusion 
— it is native to the artistic temperament — but 
few have stated it more reasonably. A man had 
to feel deeply and love England and mankind 
well to write such a book as Dagonet the Jester, 
It is a persuasive plea for a franker life, less 
fearful and more merry, and this alone should 
commend it to the family circle. ^^ Woe unto 
those," says Aaron, ^^ who are ever urging on 
the poor soul to probe into its sores and its sins, 
as if a mere thought of evil should float for ever 
like a cloud before the Mercy Seat." 

It is a pleasant theory to nourish, that every 
deserving book sooner cr later finds its way to 
37 



For Love of England 

those that can love it best. There is fate in 
these matters : a destiny that leads readers — 
by devious ways^ it is true^ and often very 
slowly, but surely enough — to those authors in 
whom they find most of that sympathy or 
attraction which it is the reader's end in life 
to discover. Some optimistic fatalists go farther 
and maintain that one always comes to a book 
at the right moment, and it is certainly true 
that in any time of stress or dubiety one never 
fails to find in one's reading some striking 
pertinence or even parallel. Destiny, we may 
at least affirm, is ever watchful to effect wise 
introductions. Sometimes her instrument is the 
reviewer : oftener this meeting grows out of 
conversations — a new friend always can tell us 
of a new book ; and now and then a belated 
appreciation performs the office. It pleases me 
to think at this moment that Destiny has 
ordained this essay. 



38 



The Traveller <?- ^ ^:^ ^> ^> 

T T E had the most beautiful neck I ever saw — a 
-*- -^ wonderful iridescence with a fugitive 
bronze light playing about over all — and he 
carried himself proudly. I remarked upon his 
distinction. '^ Oh_, that one/' said my friend ; 
^^ yes^ he is rather a swell — he won the third prize 
in the race from Barcelona to Brussels." I had 
looked at him with admiration before ; I now 
respected him^ too. He became a new^ creature : 
not merely a very lovely pigeon^ but a great 
traveller and athlete. Barcelona to Brussels. 
Think of it ! As Wilbur is to other men^ so 
is he to other birds. 

At home I took down the atlas to learn for 
myself more or less w hat that brave flying pigeon 
had seen. And truly^ as Rosalind said of 
travellers^ he has rich eyes. Assuming that he 
would fly fairly direct^ he w^ould cross the Pyrenees 
a little to the east of Mount Castabon, and there 
39 



The Traveller 

enter the fair land of France, and for five hundred 
miles have nothing but the fair land of France 
beneath him. What a privilege ! He would 
soon see Ceret below him on the left and Per- 
pignan on the right ; cross the Corbieres ; see 
Narbonne far away in the east^ Carcassonne far 
away in the west. See Carcassonne ! Is there 
not a charming ballad about seeing Carcassonne ; 
Then over the little St. Felix range^ across 
Aveyron^ with Rodez in the west and Millau in 
the east ; over the Ambrac range into Cantal, and 
then parallel with the Auvergne into the moun- 
tainous department of Puy de Dome^ %hig bang 
over Clermont. Not far here from Modestine 
and her master : very sacred ground. Crossing 
the Allier (which becomes the Loire at Nevers) 
at Moulin s^ he would fly over Nievre and over 
Yonne^ with Auxerre immediately beneath^ cross 
the Foret d'Othe into Aube, and so into Marne, 
flying over Epernay and Reims and all the white 
vineyards between^ and then crossing the purple 
Burgundian gardens into Aisne_, and up the 
southern Belgian border to Brussels. 

One wonders upon many things in thinking of 
this flight. When did he settle for food ? What 
kind of thoughts occupied his mind ? Does a 
pigeon weigh the pros and cons as we do ? — would 
he say to himself, for instance : Shall I spend the 
40 



Unknown France 

night there or shall I fly another league ? Or_, 
being tired^ would he just automatically descend 
for refreshment and rest ? We know nothing 
about birds except that their bones are full of air 
and they feel their way home. Again^ can an 
English pigeon converse with Spanish^ French, 
and Belgian pigeons ? Was there a confounding 
Tower of Babel in birdland ? Did he have any 
trouble with hawks or fowlers ? Had he any 
temptations (as I should have had) to deflect his 
course towards Paris ? Is there a Paris for 
pigeons ? 

I am glad I was shown this pigeon, because it 
sent me thus to the map of France — beautiful 
France. What an miknown country it is to me, 
and, indeed, to most Englishmen ! W^e laugh at 
the French for their ignorance of England, but it 
is nothing to our ignorance of France. The 
Frenchman's ignorance of England is complete 
and therefore honourable ; our ignorance of France 
is incomplete and therefore dangerous. For 
where do we go in France ? We go to Paris first 
and foremost ; we go to the Riviera, to Biarritz, 
to Pau, and in summer to Brittany and Normandy. 
That is to say, we go only where special prepara- 
tions are made for us — where, in short, it is not 
France, but Anglicised France. And we come 
away, most of us, with convictions as to the great 
41 



The Traveller 

French nation^ which we have never seen. This 
pigeon know^s more. 

The true France lives its own self-contained, 
wise life^ and thinks nothing of English and 
American money. The true France must be 
explored. Some day I will surely explore it. 
I, too^ will see Carcassonne and Narbonne, the 
St. Felix range and Hodez^ the Ambrac range and 
Cantal^ Puy de Dome and the Allier, Nievre and 
Yonne^ Auxerre and the Foret d'Othe. I, too, 
will visit the white vineyards of Epernay and the 
purple vineyards of Bourgogne. 

It is a melancholy and ignominious confession 
to make, that the only place seen by this pigeon 
that I also have seen is Brussels. With all these 
seven hundred miles of journey to choose from, I, 
who will never see the thirties again, know only 
Brussels — the shoddy city of Brussels. All wrong, 
all wrong. 

I wonder how Brussels struck him. Me, look- 
ing at it with merely human and not pigeon's 
eyes, it disappointed ; it seemed to me an imita- 
tion Paris — and not a good imitation either — a 
Brummagem Paris. That is, in so far as it is a 
city of boulevards and French-speaking citizens. 
But of course it is better than that really, for it 
has its Hotel de Ville, and that strange company 
of ornate fa9ades that congregate close by. And 
42 



Brussels 

it has its picture gallery^ with the early Flemish 
wonders in it — the Quintin Matsys and the Van 
Eycks. And it has a little restaurant where you 
get a better woodcock than even Paris can offer 
— but I must not mention such subjects before 
another bird. That is a faux ]jas, and under the 
shame of it I stop. 



43 



The Sympathetic Whur ^:> ^> ,^ 

A CCIDENT, often the best friend of the 
^ author^ brought me the other day a letter 

from a stranger containing invaluable information 
concerning the poet of ^^The Female Friend" 
(that masterpiece). It was particularly welcome 
to me because ever since I quoted part of ^^ The 
Female Friend" in a book called — and I am told 
by every one^ called very clumsily — Listener shure, 
I have had to parry not only questions as to its 
authorship^ but^ by the less discerning^ compli- 
ments too. In spite of what I have said^ and in 
spite also of only too great a body of evidence 
proving my incapacity^ I am still occasionally 
credited with these faultless stanzas ; which may 
now be quoted once again^ in their entirety, the 
better to make it clear to the reader how far they 
are beyond anything within my limited range : — 

In this imperfect gloomy scene 

Of complicated ill, 
How rarely is a day serene, 

The throbbing bosom still ! 

Will not 

44 



" By Subscription " 

But no^ 1 will not quote it yet. '^'^The Female 
Friend " is so incomparably the best of its author's 
poems that I will keep it to the end and first 
say something of the poet and of his other 
work. 

The author of ^'^The Female Friend" was the 
Reverend Cornelius Whur^ a clergyman minister- 
ing in East Anglia^ in — one need hardly inform 
the discriminating reader — the first half of the 
nineteenth century. His poetical effusions are 
to be found in two volumes^ Village Musings on 
Moral and Religious Subjects, published at Nor- 
wich in 1837^ and Gratitudes Offering, being 
Original Productions on a Variety of Subjects, 
published also at Norwich_, in 1845. Both collec- 
tions were published by subscription^ and many 
well-known Norfolk and Suffolk names may be 
found in the list. In Villas-e Musins:s 1 find 
the beneficent Joseph John Gurney (two copies) 
and Bernard Barton of Wood bridge (two copies). 
Joseph John Gurney^ however^ soon had enough^ 
for when Gratitude s Offering came out he 
declined to subscribe at all^ while Bernard Barton 
reduced his risk by half. Amelia Opie had one 
of each book. 

Before coming to the poems themselves^ let 
me quote from the poet's two prefaces^ the latter 
of which is dated from Pulham^ St. Mary Magda- 
45 



The Sympathetic Whur 

len, and so pave the way for the Whur anthology. 
He thus introduced Village Musings : — 

The author of the followhig pages is conscious 
of possessing but few attractions to recommend 
himself to public notice ; nor does he feel any 
disposition to impose upon society a false repre- 
sentation^ either of his abilities or situation in 
life. The information which he possesses was 
acquired in a confined circle — ^under great disr- 
advantages — and with habits of an exceedingly 
retired character. 

To persons of respectability and talent he, 
however, has had access, and to add to their 
amusement has sometimes repeated the pro- 
ductions of his own pen. His having done so 
ultimately led to pressing solicitations to appear 
in the" character which he has here assumed, but 
it will be to him a source of deep regret if the 
productions of his leisure hours be the occasion of 
offence to any, his desire and intention having 
k been to amuse and benefit all — to offend none. 

That was in 1837. Eight years later he wrote, 
on the threshold of Gratitude s Offering : — 

The title which this volume bears was adopted 
by the author in consequence of the unanticipated 
patronage he has received — the success that 
attended his former w^ork. Village Musiiigs, 
three large editions having been called for in a 
very short time. No one, he thinks, can have 
been treated more handsomely. To ladies and 

46 



Modesty and Vanity 

gentlemen who adorn the first chicles he considers 
himself under special obligations. 

The life of the writer^ he may observe^ has 
been rather eventful, and he cannot but say that 
the encouragement he has received from the Rev. 
Dr. Hall forms one of the most gratifying circum- 
stances of his history. ... In conclusion it is 
necessary only to add that the great diversity in 
the character of his readers appeared to the 
author to call for a diversity in his productions ; 
but as none of the pieces, however amusing they 
may be, are altogether destitute of a moral bear- 
ing, a hope is cherished that the work wdll in 
some degree meet the taste of society, and afford 
not only innocent amusement, but perhaps a 
measure of consolation. 

One discerns in those prefaces a very charming 
blend of modesty and pardonable vanity. The 
good Cornelius was very well satisfied with his 
rhyming gift. He did not rank it high, but he 
esteemed it, as indeed a really simple honest soul 
would and must. It is the complex folk w^io 
depreciate their wares and shrink from reading 
or repeating their verses in public. Mr. Whur 
had no false shame. I like to think of the low- 
toned, moist-eyed clergyman listening to tales of 
woe about ladies and gentlemen, amiable wives 
and intelligent children, and then hurrying off to 
poetise them, and returning with the effusion all 
hot for quiet yet effective declamation. We may 
47 



The Sympathetic Whur 

laugh now_, but it was no laughing matter then. 
I can believe that among the simple East Anghan 
gentry these little metrical pocket-handkerchiefs 
(so to speak) helped to dry many a tear^ even if 
they made new ones first. Tears can wash away 
tears^ as all comforters know. Of Cornelius's 
pulpit successes no evidence remains^ and such 
specimens of his intellect as are contained in 
these two volumes are not impressive ; but he 
fulfilled one part of a pastor's duty as it probably 
has rarely been fulfilled by a cleverer man — he 
comforted the unhappy. 

I cannot do better than begin this examination 
of his consoling muse by describing the first poem 
in Mr. Whur's second book^ for he deliberately 
placed it in that proud position^ and it illustrates 
his manner. I will not quote the poem^ but the 
poet's prologue to it — the composition of a prose 
argument being as dear to his heart as that of 
verse. For he knew exactly what he \vanted to 
say : his mind was perfectly clear ; and it was 
because he wished others to be equally so that 
he enforced his poetry with prose — as wise 
travellers used to carry a brace of pistols. The 
poem is entitled ^^ The Lady's Affecting Tale." 

The following remarkable narrative w^as put 
into the author's hands by the lady to whom it 
refers^ and who expresses herself as follows : '^ My 

48 



The Busy Scythe 

father was a clergyman of the Church of England, 

and lived and died at L , in the county of 

Suffolk. He was twenty-nine years old at the 
time of his decease. My mother was the only 

daughter of a gentleman who lived at B in 

the county of Essex^ where she had been tenderly 

brought up ; she likewise died at L in her 

twenty-seventh year. They left at their decease 
three children^ all of whom are still living. I, 
who am the youngest^ am in my sixtieth year. 
My father died three weeks before I was born, 
and my mother in twelve weeks after. My 
grandfather^ who then took the charge of us, 
died when I was four years old. We were then 
received under the care of an uncle and aunt, 
who also died a few years afterwards^ and both in 
one year. Our principal executor acted most 
dishonourably, and lived to feel its melancholy 
result. I have seen him in business and flourish- 
ing like the ^ green bay tree ' as we read in the 
thirty-seventh Psalm. His wife, a comel}^ looking 
woman, was the subject of severe mental affliction 
for upwards of twenty years, and he himself 
received relief from the parish for several years 
before he died ; and none of his children pros- 
pered in the world. But towards me, unworthy 
as I am, this scripture hath been fulfilled — ^ I 
will be a father to the fatherless.' '' Such is the 
lady's affecting tale, and the writer will in con- 
clusion add that she who had been a neglected 
orphan, was afterwards married to a gentleman 
who knows her worth, and who seeks her happi- 
ness. She is also blessed with two daughters and 

D 49 



The Sympathetic Whur 

three sons^ all of whom are sources of comfort, 
and conspire to render the close of her earthly 
pilgrimage beautiful and serene. Upon several 
occasions the author was entertained at the 
residence of this amiable female, and it was by 
her request that the following lines were written, 
and occupy their present situation. 

The "Lady's Affecting Tale" is typical; it 
offered the kind of material that Mr. Whur liked 
best. You see him here in his glory : the con- 
fidential friend with that firm basis for friendly 
confidence, a series of bereavements. You see 
him full of sympathy and gentle deference, 
visiting the comfortable house. You see the 
parlour, the antimacassars, the decanter and 
biscuits, the smelling salts, the gentility. You 
hear the exchange of texts ; you detect the 
odour of sherry. Both books have this atmo- 
sphere. The good Cornelius carried round with 
him his receptive sympathetic ear and his 
urgent sympathetic heart as steadily as Mr. 
Dobson's cure carried his green umbrella case. 
An inscrutable calamity in the life of a lady 
or gentleman made him as happy (although 
genuinely grieving) as a natural phenomenon 
made the Rev. Gilbert White, or a loose jest the 
Rev. Laurence Sterne, or a good dinner the Rev. 
Sydney Smith. He collected misfortunes. His 
50 



Emmeline Grangerford 

cabinets were full of bodily accidents and spiritual 
trials^ all neatly arranged and preserved in 
camphor. 

Mr. Whur^ if not a contemporary of Emmeline 
Grangerford, was very little before her pensive 
day. Although the Atlantic rolled between they 
were kindred souls. You remember the instant 
correspondence between the tender heart and 
the muse of that lady : so prompt that the saying 
was it was first the doctor^ then Emmeline, and 
then the undertaker. With Mr. Whur too, the 
sequence was the same. According to Buck's 
testimony, it will be remembered 

she could rattle off poetry like nothing. She 
didn't ever have to stop to think. He said she 
would slap down a line, and if she couldn't find 
anything to rhyme with it she would just scratch 
it out and slap down another one, and go ahead. 
She warn't particular ; she could write about 
anything you choose to give her to write about, 
just so it was sadful. Every time a man died, or 
a woman died, or a child died, she would be on 
hand with her '^tribute" before he was cold. 
She called them tributes. . . . The undertaker 
never got in ahead of Emmeline but once, and 
then she hung fire on a rhyme for the dead 
person's name, which was Whistler. She warn't 
ever the same after that ; she never complained, 
but she kind of pined away and did not live 



long. 



51 



The Sympathetic Whur 

Sudden death had the same fascination for 
CorneUus Whur. One can see his parishioners 
waylaying him to tell of the latest case. For the 
most part Norfolk supplied material enough for 
this branch of his poetical activity, but once he 
went as far afield for his example as Mobile in 
America (Emmeline Grangerford's own land) 
where Miss Sarah E. Norton, of Edgartown, New 
York, had fallen down dead on the day before 
her marriage while standing before a looking- 
glass. Here was a subject made to the hand of 
Cornelius Whur, for it comprised not only one of 
his favourite tragedies, but also an object that 
has always been stimulus and nourishment to the 
moralist — a looking-glass. His knowledge of 
feminine vanity, however, was less profound than 
his didactic fervour, or he would never have 
written such a stanza as this : — 

Her lovely tresses smoothly hung 

T'adorn the morrow's bride. 
When death's unerring dart was flung, 

And Sarah fell, and died. 

If I know anything of brides, whether in London 
or in Edgartown, N.Y., they do not dress their 
hair the day before the wedding. 

As a specimen of a tragedy nearer home, let us 
take this : — 

52 



The Trapfic Muse 



AN AWFUL DISPENSATION 

The following lines refer to the death of Mrs. 
Phebe R. which occurred under the subjoined 
awfully melancholy circumstances. 

The unfortunate woman was in her thirty- 
fifth year^ and had five small children, the 
youngest of whom was only thirteen weeks old. 
After the necessary arrangements had been 
observed, she bade adieu to her family, and 
having been strongly solicited, ascended a certain 
vehicle. The animal by which it was drawn 
becoming restive, poor Phebe, in a state of great 
excitement, attempted to leap out, and in doing 
so w^as killed on the spot. This dreadful 
occurrence took place within half an hour of her 
having taken leave of an affectionate husband 
and five helpless children. The gloomy circum- 
stances were related to the writer, in melancholy 
detail, by the bereaved husband. 

The beautiful baby was wrapped in her arms, 

Its sorrow was hushed into rest ; 
By fostering kindness she quelled its alarms, 

And drew the dear child to her breast. 

Thus nourished, the babe had a mother's embrace, 

And one that arose from the heart ; 
And leaving her dear in the happiest place 

With sorrow proceeded to part. 

The parting, though keen, had a dazzling beam — 

Hope ever enlightens our way ; 
Enchanting the heart, like the glow of a dream, 

For she said, ^'I shall but briefly stay I 

53 



The Sympathetic Whur 

And at my returning, thy sweet rosy cheek, 

Will give me a hallowed repast ! " 
It is thus by our fancy we hear Phebe speak, 

But the day of her nurture had past. 

For Phebe had scarcely retired from her cot, 

Her loved ones been left with regret, 
Ere she dreadfully fell ; and sad was her lot, 

Her sun in oblivion set ! 

What tongue can rehearse what her dear partner felt. 
When the tale of her woes had been told ? 

Like rush of a meteor, the blow had been dealt. 
The mystery none can unfold. 

Yes ! his dearest had fled at meridian hour. 

His -dearest his children had left. 
The innocent babes in the absence of power, 

From fostering care had been cleft ! 

But God, whose designs are a fathomless deep, 

*' Moves in a mysterious way''; 
Not ceasing His footsteps in darkness to keep. 

Till time and its shadows decay. 

At that awful moment, with beamings of light, 

He'll over our faculties throw 
A power to discover He did what was right, 

And that was triumphant below ! 

That poem is not unworthy to be set beside the 
ode on the death of Stephen Dowhng Bots^ thus 
proving once again how great a book is Huckle- 
berry Finn, where Emmeline Grangerford is^ of 
course^ to be found. 

54 



The Optimist 

Mr. Whur's faith^ it will be seen, was of the 
most elementary. He believed in this life as a 
preparation for the next ; he believed we were 
all in the Everlasting Arms ; he believed that 
affliction should yield to rhetoric, and he had, I 
fancy, no patience with those troubled ones who 
could hold out against his facile panaceas. 
Comfort, when one is as sure as this, and given 
a tender heart, becomes a simple thing. It 
resolves itself into the formula of Dr. Pangloss. 
To the bereaved and poverty-stricken, to the 
deaf and dumb, to the blind — even (as we shall 
see) to the armless and legless — the sympathetic 
Whur, prosperously and briskly exercising all his 
faculties, had messages of consolation, genuine if 
automatic. '^^ Never despond," he said; ^^ God 
will make up to you for this," he said; ^^Your 
crown will be the brighter," said he. 

To take an extreme case, a youth who was 
saved from the wreck in which his father and 
mother, uncle, and nine brothers and sisters were 
drowned, was reminded that he himself was 
saved, and therefore bidden to be of good 
optimistic cheer : — 

Dost thou, in wandering there, that scene review ? 
And heeding that, canst thou forget the Hand 
Which was outstretched when trembling rope became 
Thine only stay? Deem not thyself preserved 

55 



The Sympathetic Whur 

In hour so dark merely to ruminate 
On that event from gratitude apart : 
For then, when consternation spread around 
And none remained thy sinking heart to cheer, 
JehovaJi s arm, although invisible, 
Wafted each billow, and was there to save ! 
Nor should'st thou cease His wond'rous power to heed, 
Since He^ though every earthly friend has fled, 
Can friendship raise to shape thy future way, 
And guiding thee in each succeeding scene. 
Thou wilt exclaim — ''''He hath done all things well P'* 

One feels that it would have been a cruel thing 
to ask this glib and beaming consoler ,why 
Jehovah's arm was not beneath those other waves 
which engulfed the balance of the family. There 
are certain types of simple believers whom no 
sceptic but the dastard or the cad can attack^ and 
the Rev. Cornelius Whur came high among them. 
In default of a catastrophe Mr. Whur would 
make himself comfortable in a cemetery. Tomb- 
stones never failed to move him. He has a 
number of poems upon graves^ all amusing but 
too long to quote. As a specimen of his mortuary 
manner here is the exordium of ^^The Lady's 
Tomb " : — 

A young gentleman^ who is a Clergyman^ and 
who had the misfortune to lose his amiable lady 
a few weeks subsequently to her confinement, by 
a severe attack of influenza, gave instructions for 
a grave to be prepared, nine feet in depth, for 

56 



Graveyard Poetry 

the reception of her loved remains^ intending, as 
he afterwards informed the author, to rest there 
himself. It may likewise be proper to inform the 
reader that the lady left behind a sweet little 
boy. About thirteen w^eeks previously to this 
sad event the writer had the honour of dining 
with this excellent young lady, and being in 
the neighbourhood in which she had resided he 
again w^aited upon the bereaved gentleman, and 
accompanied him to the melancholy spot where 
the sharer of his former joys was reposing. 
Several years afterwards this excellent Clergyman 
removed to a distant part of the kingdom, and 
in the lines which follow he is supposed, previously 
to his departure, to have visited the scene, and 
when standing by the tomb of the deceased lady 
her spirit is to be understood as having addressed 
him as she is represented to have done in the 
verses which are subjoined. 

The poem is, as usual, merely the same thing 
over again, but not so concise. One tomb poem 
I may, however, quote in full. With great dar- 
ing it is written in the metre of ^^ The Soldier's 
Dream," almost the least suitable that could be 
chosen by an indifferent technician. 

THE ROSE-COVERED GRAVE 

The author, in passing through a beautiful 
churchyard in the county of Norfolk, was particu- 
larly struck with the appearance of a recently 
covered grave, which was surrounded by a 

57 



The Sympathetic Whur 

profusion of roses. Afterwards while proceeding 
on his journey he casually overtook the gentle- 
man whose lady had been interred in the grave 
which had engaged his attention, and of whose 
sudden departure he gave the following relation : 
He had an only daughter, who at the period 
referred to was seriously indisposed, and who had 
been deploring that circumstance in consequence 
of the inconvenience it occasioned in the family. 
The lady, who at that time was in perfect health, 
endeavoured to console the mind of her afflicted 
daughter by exclaiming, -^ Thank God, I am quite 
well, and will alleviate your sufferings ! " But 
within twenty minutes the affectionate mother, 
who had this spoken, was a corpse, and in the 
above-named grave her remains were reposing. 

The morning arose, and its beauties were beaming, 
As they danced in her vision like snow-crested wave ; 

But alas ! as such splendours were brilliantly gleaming, 
She retired to repose in the rose-covered grave ! 

That hour was a season of gloomy decision, 
For no merciful hand was uplifted to save ; 

Nor aught to illuminate the dark-clouded vision, 

As she stood on the brink of her rose-covered grave ! 

She'd heard too, to add to the keen separation, 
A long nurtured daughter despondently rave ; 

Nor could she but sigh for a deai'er relation, 
Who would weep as she went to her rose-covered grave ! 

Yet she fell 'mid emotions of exquisite sorrow, 
So awfully did the grim monster behave ; 

And the .sad apparatus was used on the morrow, 
To prepare for her rest in the rose-covered grave ! 

58 



The Cane Sinister 

And there, as the breezes are wantonly playing, 
The beautiful buds will develop and wave ; 

And zephyrs will chance as their fragrance is straying 
To sweeten the scene of the rose-covered grave ! 

Such — such is the spot, yet this pleasing reflection 
May arise from His goodness who liveth to save — 

Though her spirit hath fled, it is 'neath His protection, 
Till she ceases to sleep in the rose-covered grav€ ! 

Here you see Mr. Whur at his happiest. He is 
the kind of man who would build his country- 
house in the valley of the shadow. His very 
walking-stick smelt of mortality, for before it 
came to his hand 

it had been the property and daily companion of 
a gentleman (a member of the Church of England) 
who although a layman, most laudably employed 
several evenings in each week preaching to and 
instructing the peasantry in diflPerent cottages 
in his neighbourhood. This gentleman upon a 
certain occasion gathered what he supposed to be 
mushrooms, in eating of which himself, a sister, 
and a little boy were poisoned. 

But Cornelius w^as not always serious : he had 
his levities too. One of his poems describes his 
adventures on journeying into Northamptonshire 
to preach, and being arrested by mistake im- 
mediately on arrival and conveyed to the chief 
constable. The little error, however, led to the 
59 



The Sympathetic Whur 

discovery of a Avhole nest of new and warm 
friends for the victim — pious gentlemen and 
amiable ladies^ after his own heart— and he 
therefore had nothing but gratitude for the 
adventure. But why do I narrate the incident 
when Mr. Whur's own words are available ? 

On Sunday mornings March 5, 1843 [he writes], 
a certain minister [himself^ for a pound!] who 
happened to be an entire stranger^ w^as requested 
to preach in a place of worship which is situated 
in Nort ha Dipt 071 shire. Unfortunately^ however, his 
object not having been properly understood, he 
was unceremoniously addressed by a Policeman, 
and by him taken to a gentleman who happened 
to be the Constable. But notwithstanding this 
unpropitious conmiencement, a large circle of 
friends was subsequently raised up, w^ho treated 
the preacher in question with much Christian 
courtesy ; and it is by the express desire of a 
highly respectable gentleman who was present 
upon the occasion that the singular circumstance 
is referred to, and has a place in this volume. 

Another light, or less weighty, poem takes the 
form of an address to a dog in the possession of a 
chemist, '^ a gentleman of literary habits who 
mixes but little in society," whose affection for 
the animal altered not, no matter how variable 
the seasons. The ode concludes with this 
stanza : — 

Go 



" The Unexpected Boy " 

But, as for thee, such is thy state, 

Thou wouldst, hadst thou right organs, sing 

To magnify thy loaded plate. 

And bless the guiding hand of fate 

That put thee 'neath a Chemist's wing ! 

Another poem more or less in this genre feUcitates 
a happy but tardy couple under the straightfor- 
ward title "The Unexpected Boy" : — 

The following lines were addressed to a gentle- 
man, who had no children save an only daughter, 
and as nearly thirteen years had elapsed since 
her birth, no addition to the family was contem- 
plated. But contrary to previous calculation, a 
most interesting little boy vouchsafed to pay his 
parents an unexpected visit by introducing him- 
self to notice, August 11, 1839- 

The poem opens thus : — 

He who regulates the storm, 

Sends the rain and falling dew, 
]\Iight as kind an act perform, 

And by lovely child — bless you ! 
Hath He not a thousand ways 

To increase His creature's joy ? 
Have you not the happiest days 

In the unexpected boy? 

We come upon satire in the poem " occasioned 

by hearing of a gentleman who occupies a rather 

distinguished position in the religious world, 

whose visits to the looking-glass, as some suppose, 

61 



The Sympathetic Whur 

are unbecoming^ and too frequently repeated." 
But Mr. Whur's heart was not in satirical or jocular 
exercises. Pathos was his real line : death and 
disaster and physical affliction. The maimed 
appealed to him at once^ and he had a peculiar, 
almost Barnumesque^ faculty of alighting upon 
intelligent deformities ; and having alighted 
upon them one may be sure that he lost no 
time in pointing out the compensations of 
their unhappy lot. An early poem in his first 
volume is addressed to a little girl ^^ who was 
born without either legs or arms, and who (of 
course) is altogether dependent upon her 
parents under all circumstance.'' The poem 
begins questioningly : — 

Not having legs or arms, how wilt thou play 
Thy part, or act Hfe's drama? 

It continues — 

Thou wilt, I fear, find friends a rarity ! 

At least, such friends as thou wilt then require, 

Mere body as thou art, not having feet 

Or hands to help thee ; I thy state divine 

As most unpromising — from friends apart, 

And marvel greatly that thou hast no care, 

Nor yet a thought touching thy condition ! 

A voice from heaven, speaking through the 
child, supplies the solution : — 
62 



"The Armless Artist" 

He, who sees all, 
Wealthy or indigent, effective or 
Feeble, who giveth each his daily food, 
Guarding from harm or lack unnumbered worlds, 
Directs His eye on me complacently ! 

In another and similar case the precise assist- 
ance rendered to the afflicted by Heaven is ex- 
plained. The poem is called ^^The Armless 
Artist/' and it was '^ suggested by seeing an artist 
who was born without arms^ who supports himself 
and his parents also by his profession. The 
parties^ being but in humble life^ the circum- 
stance ought to be viewed as one of Jehovah's 
extraordinary methods of relieving those who^were 
in a trying situation." The poem opens thus, a 
moment or so after the birth of the prodigy : — 

''Alas! alas!" the father said, 

" O what a dispensation ! 
How can we be by mercy led, 

In such a situation? 
Be not surprised at my alarms, 
The dearest boy is without arms ! " 

The monologue goes on in an increase of pessimism, 
ending with these expressions of despair : — 

*' I have no hope, nor confidence, 

The scene around is dreary ; 
How can I meet such vast expense? 

I am by trying, weary. 
You must, my dearest, plainly see. 
This armless boy will ruin me." 



The Sympathetic Whur 

The prose argument has ah-eacly told us, in 
defiance of art, what the sequel was. The boy 
became an accomplished artist ; but whether he 
held the brush in his mouth or in his toes we are 
not informed. If he was half as good as the 
armless artist whose pencil drawings are ex- 
hibited in a stationer's in Holborn, he was a 
wonder indeed. 

It was a lady, it will be remembered, who 
commissioned the first poem in Mr. Whur's book, 
and one^ gathers from a perusal of his pages that 
he held himself always very ready to obey the 
behests of the fairer members of his flock ; 
although now and then we find him accepting 
poetical suggestions from gentlemen too. For 
example, the poem entitled ^^ The Early Adieu," 
although even without an invitation Mr. Whur 
must inevitably have written it, was requested 
by a young gentleman to whom this sad and 
untimely farewell was breathed. Let Mr. Whur 
relate the melancholy circumstances : — 

The lines below refer to the premature 
departure of an interesting young lady, w^hose 
hand had been promised to a gentleman between 
whom and herself a mutual attachment had 
existed for several years. For some considerable 
time the health of this amiable young lady had 
been declining, and early in 1839 alarming 

64 



Symmetrical Dissolution 

symptoms rendered her removal to a more 
salubrious part of the kmgdom indispensable. 

But alas ! it was too late^ and the change of 
scene not having produced any of its desired 
effects^ an immediate return to her native village 
became imperatively necessary. 

The young lady^ therefore^ under the care 
of her parents and the object of their anxious 
solicitude^ after five days of successive travelling 
arrived at home. But ere the shades of evening 
had enveloped the place which gave her birth^ 
she^ leaning her head upon the shoulder of the 
young gentleman^ whispered adieu ! 

The writer afterwards saw the grave of this 
accomplished young lady^ and by the request of 
her unfortunate lover introduces the melancholy 
circumstances to the notice of his readers. 

It is a question if the bereaved lover was Mr. 
Whur's ultimate quarr}^ 1 fancy he wrote more 
for the ladies than for the gentlemen^ and^ like 
all poets^ had one Laura^ one Beatrice_5 most 
prominent in his thoughts. Mr. Whur mentions 
no names^ but we are probably within our rights 
in assuming the female friend of his finest 
poetical effort to be that divinity. She was not 
his own^ this lady — this Female — but another's. 
She v/as the ^'^accomplished wife of an eminent 
minister of the gospel." But she was Mr. 
Whur's ideal : she fulfilled his conditions. She^ 
of all the ladies with whom he drank tea, 
E 65 



The Sympathetic Whur 

was the one chosen by him to be described as 
the perfect type. 

In this imperfect, gloomy scene 

Of complicated ill, 
How rarely is a day serene, 

The throbbing bosom still ! 
Will not a beauteous landscape bright, 

Or music's soothing sound, 
Console the heart, afford delight, 

And throw sweet peace around ? 
They may, but never comfort lend, 
Like an accomplish'd female friend ! 

With such a friend, the social hour 

In sweetest pleasure glides ; 
There is in female charms a power 

Which lastingly abides — 
The fragrance of the blushing rose, 

Its tints and splendid hue. 
Will with the season decompose, 

And pass as flitting dew ; 
On firmer ties his joys depend 
Who has a polish'd female friend ! 

The pleasures which from thence arise 

Surpass the blooming flower. 
For though it opens to the skies, 

It closes in an hour ! 
Its sweetness is of transient date, 

Its varied beauties cease — 
They can no lasting joys create, 

Impart no lasting peace : 
While both arise, and duly blend 
In an accomplish'd female friend ! 

66 



"The Female Friend'' 

As orbs revolve and years recede, 

As seasons onward roll, 
The fancy may on beauties feed. 

With discontented soul I 
A thousand objects bright and fair 

May for a moment shine. 
Yet many a sigh and many a tear 

But mark their swift decline ; 
While lasting joys the man attend 
W^ho has a faithful female friend ! 

That is the poem — that is the Rev. Cornelius 
Whur's masterpiece. It is sad to think that the 
lady remains unknown. One would like^ with 
caution^ to make inquiries as to her descendants. 
Her great-granddaughter may have a hockey- 
stick over her shoulder at this moment ; may be 
in HoUoway ; or^ atavism intervening^ may be 
^^ polished" too. We shall probably never know. 



67 



The Lord of Life o <z^ ^> ^^ 

" What right has that man to have a spaniel ? " said a witty 
lady, pointing to a bully : " spaniels should be a reward." 

T N his prescription for the perfect home South ey 
included a little girl rising six years and a 
kitten rising six weeks. That is perhaps the 
prettiest thing that ever found its way from his 
pen — that patient^ plodding^ bread-wiuning pen^ 
which he drove with such pathetic industry as 
long as he had any power left with which to urge 
it forwarJ. A little girl rising six years and a 
kitten rising six weeks. Charming^ isn't it ? 

But^ my dear rascally Lake Poet^ what about 
a puppy rising six months } How did you come 
to forget that } — such a puppy as is in this room 
as I write : a small black puppy of the Cocker 
spaniel blood_, so black that had the good God 
not given him a gleaming white corner to his 
wicked little eye^ one would not know at dinner 
whether he was sitting by one's side or not — not^ 
68 



Vitality 

that is^ until his piercing shrieks^ signifying that 
he had been (very properly) trodden on again^ 
rent the welkin. 

This puppy have I called the Lord of Life 
because I cannot conceive of a more complete 
embodiment of vitality^ curiosity^ success^ and 
tyranny. Vitality first and foremost. It is in- 
credible that so much pulsating quicksilver^ 
so much, energy and purpose^ should be packed 
into a foot and a half of black hide. He is up 
earliest in the mornings he retires last at night. 
He sleeps in the day^ it is true^ but it is sleep 
that hangs by a thread. Let there be a footfall 
out of place^ let a strange dog in the street 
venture but to breathe a little louder than usual^ 
let the least rattle of plates strike upon his ear_, 
and his sleep is shaken from him in an instant. 
From an older dog one expects some of this 
watchfulness. For an absurd creature of four 
months with one foot still in the cradle to be 
so charged with vigilance is too ridiculous. 

If nothing occurs to interest him, and his eyes 
are no longer heavy (heavy I he never had heavy 
eyes), he will make drama for himself. He will 
lay a slipper at your feet and bark for it to 
be thrown. I admire him most when he is 
returning with it in his mouth. The burden 
gives him responsibility : his four black feet, much 

69 



The Lord of Life 

too big for his body, all move at once with a 
new importance and rhythm. When he runs for 
the slipper he is just so much galvanised puppy 
rioting with life ; when he returns he is an 
official, a guardian, a trustee ; his eye is grave 
and responsible ; the conscientious field spaniel 
wakes in him and asserts itself. 

As to his curiosity, it knows no bounds. He 
must be acquainted with all that happens. What 
kind of a view of human life a dog, even a big dog, 
acquires, I have sometimes tried to imagine by 
kneeling or lying full length on the ground and 
looking up. The world then becomes strangely 
incomplete ; one sees little but legs. Of course 
the human eye is set differently in the head, and 
a dog can visualise humanity without injuring 
his neck as I must do in that grovelling posture ; 
but none the less the dog's view of his master 
standing over him must be very partial, very 
fragmentary. Yet this little puppy, although 
his eyes are within eight inches of the ground, 
gives the impression that he sees all. He goes 
through the house with a microscope. 

But for his dependence, his curiosity, and his 
proprietary instinct to be studied at their best, 
you should see him in an empty house. All dogs 
like to explore empty houses with their masters, 
but none more than he. His paws never so 
70 



Thoughts Visible 

resound as when they patter over the bare 
boards of an empty house. He enters each room 
with the eye of a builder^ tenant^ auctioneer_, 
furnisher and decorator in one. I never saw 
such comprehensive glances^ such a nose for a 
colour scheme. But leave him by accident behind 
a closed door and see what happens. Not the 
mandrake torn bleeding from its earth ever 
shrieked more melancholy. But tears are instant 
w^ith him always_, in spite of his native cheerfulness. 
It was surely a puppy that inspired the proverb 
about crjdng before you are hurt. 

I spoke of his success. That is perhaps his 
most signal characteristic^ for the world is at his 
feet. Whether indoors or out he has his own 
way^ instantly follows his own inclination. It is 
one of his most charming traits that he thinks 
visibly. I often watch him thinking. '^'^ Surely it's 
time tea was brought/' I can positively see him^ 
saying to himself. ''I hope that cake wasn't 
finished yesterday : it was rather more decent 
than usual. I believe those girls eat it in the 
kitchen." Or, ^^ He's putting on his heavy boots : 
that means the hill. Good ! I'll get near the 
door so as to be sure of slipping out with him." 
Or^ ^'^It's no good ; he's not going for a walk this 
morning. That stupid old desk again, I suppose." 
Or, '^ Who was that ? Oh, only the postman. I 



The Lord of Life 

shan't bark for him." Or_, ^^ I'm getting awfully 
hungry. I'll go and worry the cook." 

In what way a dog expresses these thoughts I 
have no guess (it is one of the leading counts in 
the indictment of science that it knows nothing 
about dogs and does not try to learn) ; but one 
can see the words passing in procession through 
his little mind as clearly as if it were made of 
glass. 

But the most visible token of his success is the 
attention^ the homage^ he receives from strangers. 
For he not only dominates the house^ but he has 
a procession of admirers after him in the streets. 
Little girls and middle-aged ladies equally ask 
permission to pat him. Old gentlemen (the 
villains !) ask if he is for sale^ and inquire his price. 
Not that he looks valuable — as a matter of fact^ 
though pure he is not remarkable — but that he 
:Suggests so much companionship and fun. One 
recognises instantly the Vital Spark. 

When it comes to the consideration of his tyranny, 
there enters a heavy spaniel named Bush and a 
dainty capricious egoist in blue-grey fur whom we 
will call Smoke. Smoke once had a short way 
with dogs ; but the Lord of Life has changed all 
that. Smoke once w^ould draw back a paw of 
velvet, dart it forward like the tongue of a serpent 
and return to sleep again, perfectly secure in her 
72 



Smoke and Bush 

mind that that particular dog would harass her no 
more. But do you think she ever hurt the puppy 
in that way ? Never. He loafs into the room with 
his hands in his pockets and his head full of mis- 
chief^ perceives a long bushy blue-grey tail hanging 
over the edge of the sofa, and forthwith gives it 
such a pull with his teeth as a Siberian house- 
holder who had been out late and had lost his 
latch-key might at his door-bell when the wolves 
were after him. An ordinary dog would be 
blinded for less ; but not so our friend. Smoke 
merely squeaks reproach, and in a minute or two, 
when the puppy has tired a little of the game, 
he is found not only lying beside her and steal- 
ing her warmth, but lying in the very centre of 
the nest in the cushion that she had fashioned 
for herself. Tyranny, if you like ! 

And Bush ? Poor Bush. For every spoiled new- 
comer there is I suppose throughout life an old 
faithful friend who finds himself on the shelf 
It is not quite so bad as this with Bush, and 
when the puppy grows up and is staid too. Bush 
will return to his own again ; but I must admit that 
at the beginning he had a very hard time of it. 
For the puppy, chiefly by hanging on his ear, first 
infuriated him into siilks, and then, his mastery 
being recognised, set to work systematically to 
tease and bully him. The result is that now Bush 
73 



The Lord of Life 

actually has to ask permission before he dares to 
take up his old seat by my chair : he may have 
it only if the puppy does not want it. 

Bush^ I ought to say^ has lately been tried 
by a succession of new dogs ; and although the 
present puppy is his most powerful super-dog^ he 
allowed all to acquire an improper influence and 
knuckled under with deplorable tameness. The 
first interloper w^as an Aberdeen^ who taught 
him to rove. Before that he had never left the 
garden alone ; now he began to absent himself 
for hours^ sometimes whole nights. It w^as all 
Scottie's doings one could see. That small but 
insidious creature was of original sin compact — 
was everything that Bush was not. Scottie was 
unwilling^ disobedient_, independent^ impenitent. 
When we went out for a walk he started with me 
punctually enough ; but he returned alone. At 
what point he disappeared^ 1 never knew. He 
dissolved . 

At night — for their kennels adjoined — he 
sapped Bush's character. 

^" Directly we are let loose^ to-morrow^/' he 
would say^ '' let's go up to the Common and 
hunt." 

^^ No/' said Bush ; '- they w^ouldn't like it. He 
would not like it." (I am He.') 

'' Oh, never mind him/' said Scottie. " After 
74 



The North Briton 

all^ what does it mean ? Only a whack or two, 
and it's all over/' 

'^ But we shall be tied up all day." 

"No^ you won't. Just keep on barking and 
whining, and they'll let you loose in self- 
defence." 

(He knew what he was talking about here^ for 
on one cold night he won his way back into the 
house entirely by this device. The little black- 
guard !) 

After a while Bush consented. 

1 had proof one night of the ascendancy which 
Scottie (aged ten months) had obtained over Bush 
(aged five years). I chained them up and went 
for some water. When I returned, Scottie was 
in Bush's large kennel, where he had no right ; 
but it was warmer. ^^ Come out/' I said. But 
instead of coming out, Scottie whispered threaten- 
ingly to Bush : " You go " ; and out crawled the 
spaniel and abjectly began to squeeze his shoulders, 
into Scottie' s minute abode. 

I should not be surprised if these conversations 
are not minutely true to life ; but one can, of 
course, never know : not at any rate until one 
meets Cerberus on the banks of the Styx — as w^e 
all must — and puts a few leading questions to him 
as to dog nature, while waiting for the ferry. 

But Bush is not my theme ; Bush was never a 
75 



The Lord of Life 

Lord of Life : his pulse was always a little slow, his 
nature a little too much inclined to accept rather 
than initiate. Nor, I suppose, will our Lord of Life 
be quite such a Lord much longer, for with age 
will come an increase of sobriety, a diminution of 
joy. That he will not untimely fall by the way, 
but will grow up to serious spanielhood, I feel as 
sure as if an angel had forewarned me ; but were 
he now to die this should be his epitaph : — ^^ Here 
lies a Lord of Life, aged six months. He would 
never be broken to the house, but was adorable 
after sin." 



76 



A Confession <:><:> ^> ^^ ,^ 

^^ T DON'T like to go out with this thing on 
my conscience 

^- 1 want to tell the whole story and die in 
peace 

^^ Let me begin at the beginning. 

'^ I was an only dog. I had a very happy home. 
My mistress was a beautiful woman^ with long 
skirts on which I was allowed to lie. My master 
was a magnificent man^ fond of w^alking. They 
were both weak^ too^ and fed me at meals with 
little bits^ and let me lie close to the fire. That 
was upstairs^ where, of course^ I best liked 
to be ; but downstairs was good too^ for the 
girls did not mind dogs (as some do^ I am 
told), and there was a handy-man named Vin- 
cent who fed me very punctually, and with whom 
I walked out on his errands, even though I 
could see that he tried to make people think 
I was his. 

77 



A Confession 

^^ That was in London^ in a house near Kensing- 
ton Gardens, where I had many friends. 

'^ In the country I was equally lucky, for we 
moved every spring to a place with many rabbits 
in it, and though I never caught one I rejoiced 
in their proximity. It had very sunny places to 
lie in, too. 

'^ You see how happy I was, as happy as only 
an only dog can be. 

^* There is my tragedy. 

'^'^ How little we expect the upheavals of life! 
One day my master returned in the evening, 
much as usual, but carrying a basket. Fish I 
thought, without enthusiasm; cat's food, or 
perhaps fruit, which is, if possible, duller still. 
But I was woefully wrong, for out of this basket 
he took a small black creature — one of the kind 
known, I believe, as an Aberdeen terrier, a breed 
I have always disliked. I, as you have noticed, 
am a water spaniel. 

'^ ^ Here, Rush,' he said (my name is Rush), ^ is 
a companion for you ! ' and he held the thing 
towards me. Companion ! For some days, I 
need hardly say, I did not approach the rep- 
tile, and I kept away also from my master and 
mistress, just to punish them, although I am 
afraid they were too much occupied with their 
new toy to observe it. And then gradually I 

78 



Jealousy 

allowed myself to come round and to resume 
my old habits. 

^^ But how different everything was ! At meal 
times, whereas I used to get all the tit-bits^ I 
now received only half; when my master whistled 
in the old days it was for me^ but now it might 
also be for that other ; and indeed he was often 
there before me. In shorty I was no longer an 
only dog. 

^'^ Things went on like this for some months^ 
until one day Peter (as they called him) began 
to be ill ; and he got worse and worse^ and at 
last died. One had, of course, to make some 
show of grief, but, by Sirius, how glad I was at 
heart ! I had the greatest difficulty to keep my 
tail still — it would wag ; and when I heard my 
mistress say, ^ Well, in future, dear. Rush shall 
be our only dog/ I had to pretend I had a flea 
to cover my emotion. 

^^ From that moment all my old happiness re- 
turned ; I had the place again to myself ; I had 
all the hearthrug, and all the tit-bits, and all 
the caresses, and all the walks. My master grew 
in magnificence, my mistress in beauty. 

" But alas ! human beings have very change- 
able minds ; and one day what should appear 
out of an equally blue sky but another basket, 
from which there crawled another dog ; but this 
79 



A Confession 

time a more genuine article^ a Cocker spaniel 
pup. The first thing he dicl_, as if his mere 
presence were not enough^ was to frisk towards 
me and set his horribly sharp httle teetii in my 
ear. Naturally 1 gave him a nip that sent him 
screaming round the room^ and my master o})ened 
the door and sternly ordered me out^ while my 
mistress caught the creature in her arms and 
kissed it. A good beginning 1 

^^ And so it went on. At first I was always in 
disgrace for complaining of assault or for showing 
my intense disapproval of the vacillation of these 
people and the loss of my recovered privileges ; 
for once again the hearthrug ceased to be my 
own^ and I secured only half the tit-bits^ and 
when my master snapped his fingers I often did 
not get there firsts for these little cockers are 
confoundedly nippy, and Vincent^ when he took 
me out^ took the other too. Later^ for the sake 
of peace^, I allow^ecl myself to appear to be playing 
with the little brute ; but how I hated him and 
despised myself for it. 

^^ It was Avhile I was one day meditating on my 
iTiisery that a brilliant thought came to me — 
brilliant as I considered it then, but wicked as I 
know now. It is^ as you are probably aware^ the 
nature of the spaniel to be^ while friendly to all, 
passionately faithful to one alone, and that one 
80 



Treachery 

a man. This little dog was too young and in- 
experienced to have come to any conclusions 
about the composition of a household : he was 
naturally without knowledge of class or degree. 
My plan was to take advantage of his ignorance 
and plasticity, and persuade him that Vincent, 
the handy-man, was his master, and thus bend 
his affection entirely in Vincent's direction. 

^^ I knew enough of our real master to be sure 
that directly he found out that the dog liked 
Vincent more than himself he w^ould lose interest 
in him and let him go — give him away to the 
next caller, or even sack Vincent and the dog 
with him. 

" And so it was ; the scheme worked perfectly. 
The little dog attached himself to Vincent with 
an adoring persistence. Nothing could get him 
away, or if he were induced to go upstairs, he 
was continually running to the door and whining 
for (as he thought) his master. 

'^ Our real master was furious. ' Confound the 
dog!' he used to say, or ^What's the use of a 
dog that doesn't love you ? ' And then he would 
lay his hand on my head and say that at any 
rate I was loving and faithful, until I didn't 
know where to look. And then one day it all 
worked out as I had conceived, and the little 
dog was given to a neighbour. . . . 
F 8i 



A Confession 

" I have never been happy since^ for 1 had 
robbed my dear master and mistress of a pet^ and 
set a stone where my heart should be^ just 
through my vile jealousy and selfishness ; while 
as for poor Vincent_, he was heartbioken_, and he 
seemed to understand that I had a paw in the 
business^ for he was never the same to me again. 

^' Yes^ I did a low things and I am sorry for it. 
I did a thing that no spaniel and gentleman 
ought to do. I wish you would kick me once^ 
liard^ and then I could die happy." 



82 



Simple Souls ^> «^ 



M 



I. — The Millionaire Manque 

Y barber and I had talked a great deal 
about Christmas before its arrival. A 
Pole by birth and a cosmopolitan by chance^ he 
married an English wife^ and has two children^ 
who seem to be essentially English too. Inci- 
dentally he is an enthusiastic cook^ and the 
artistic treatment of the turkey occupied many 
of his thoughts. ^^ I am going/' he told me^ ^^to 
put oysters in the stuffing." ^^ Oysters ? " ^^ Yais ; 
they are fine — fine. I shall cook them firsts cut 
them up small^ and mix them in with the sage 
and onions. That is^ of course/' he added^ '^^if 

Mr. P gives me the turkey again." Mr. 

P , I may say^ is another customer^ whose 

Christmas-box to my little Pole takes this admir- 
able shape. 

^^ Did the turkey come?" I asked after Christ- 

83 



Simple Souls 

mas. '' Yais/' he said. '^ Nineteen pounds. 
The missis took it to have it weighed. Nineteen 
pounds^ three ounces. It lasted exactly a week. 
We had it roasted^ hot^ and then cold^ and then 
grilled^ and stewed^ and hashed. I said to the 
missis^ ^ For Heaven's sake don't let me see that 
turkey again ! ' " 

^^ And the oysters ? " His face fell. " The 
oysters. I was going to tell you. One of my 
friends, the man at the second chair on the other 
side of the room^ with the big moustache^ he 
came to me on Christmas Eve and he said he had 
a book for me to read in the holidays. It was 
the best book^ he said, he had ever read, and he 
would lend it to me. It was called How to Become 
a Millionaire. Well, I would like to be a million- 
aire, and so I took it. Yais, I wrapped it up 
carefully in a newspaper, because he is a 
particular fellow, and it had his name in it, and 
after we had shut I hurried to get the things for 
the cooking. 

^^ First I went to a greengrocer's for some nuts 
— Brazil nuts, what I love. Then I went to the 
fishmonger's for the oysters. I had just fixed 
on the kind of oysters I would have, and he had 
begun to open them, when I found I had not 
got the book. I told the man to wait a minute, 
and I ran back to the nut shop, where I had left 

84 



Betsy's Confidante 

it. It had gone. Yais^ gone. Some one had 
taken it. Oh^ I was disappointed. He is a very 
particular fellow^ and it cost six shilHngs. He 
told me so. He has told me so ever since. 1 
have got to get another copy. How to Become 
a Millionaire, it is called. Six shillings. And 
so I never had the oysters at all. I could not 
afford them.'' 



H. — Betsy's Confidante 

Two old letters in faint ink^ in an elegantly 
sloped hand on paper yellow with age^ lie 
before me. The first is dated a few days before 
Waterloo^ and is written from one young lady of 
seventeen or eighteen to another^ and if I were 
editing Miss Austen I think I should print it as it 
stands as an appendix. Now^ however^ I quote 
only a part : — 

O ! my dear Girl^ I have some interesting 
adventures to relate to you^ which are in them- 
selves equally pleasing and distressing ; truly I 
am in such a dilemma that I cannot tell how to 
act ; love^ duty^ and reason all call loudly upon 
me to obey their various dictates^ whereby my 
ideas are disturbed beyond my ability to express ; 
however^ as I know you will feel interested in 
my happiness^ you shall be made acquainted with 
my earnest wishes^ which are as follow^ viz. : to 



Simple Souls 

disengage myself from all gentlemen for the 
present, and after a short time to marry a man 
whom I do not yet know. 

That is a generalisation by way of preamble. 
The recipient of the letter was, I conjecture, by 
no means hoodwinked by the irrelevant family 
news that followed : she knew the rules of the 
game, and was conscious that particulars would 
soon emerge. And she was right ; but first came 
another break-aw^ay : — 

Betsy, when do you mean to get married ? 
You never favour me with saying a word about 
your suitors, and I am confident you attract the 
admiration of many Huntingdonshire and Bed- 
fordshire beaux ; now do let me entreat that you 
will shortly come into Northamptonshire and try 
your influence amongst the beaux of my dear 
native country. 

Now, however, to business in earnest, begin- 
ning with Mr. S. 

I shall, however, pass a couple of days with my 

revered friend, Mr. W , one of which will be 

Sunday next, when I shall hope for a short 
interview with Mr. S. Most likely I shall then 
bid him affinal adieu. But oh ! my heart ! what 
will thy sufferings be ? Perhaps, alas ! irremedi- 
able. It is proper before I proceed further to 
inform you that I received before I despatched my 
last letter to you a most kind and affectionate 
^6 



Many Suitors 

letter from Mr. S. Timidity occasioned his little 
delay^ which I imagined was the case. My 

indecision is occasioned by my Uncle D 's 

disapprobation of him^ on account of his want of 

Fortune^ nor does Mr. W entirely approve^ 

for the same caiise^ but he kindly advises me to 
please myself. Much as I esteem Mi. S., yet I 
feel more inclined to submit to the loss of him 
than to displease my beloved uncle ; yet^ O ! my 
dearest Betsy ! I already feel that the loss will 
be irreparable^ ah ! ever^ ever so. 

Even in despair^ however^ the wheels of life 
run on. The letter proceeds thus : — 

I wTote to Mr. D about a month ago^ but 

have made no reply yet to a certain letter, 
because I cannot fix a firm resolve either w^ay. 
Suppose he should go and fix on a second lass in 
this protracted suspense ! But I wdll endeavour 
shortly to bring the affair to a conclusion of some 
kind. I wish you had his sweet letter before- 
your eyes; but why do I thus dwell upon this 
subject and delight miyself with it, wdien perhaps 
it is better that I should for ever banish him from 
my affections ? I now speak in allusion to his 
asthma ; be assured I regard not riches more 
than a straw. 

This, however, is not the end. There is still 
another ^' string " : — 

Mr. H. C. has been extremely attentive to me 
throughout the last winter and spring. Last 



Simple Souls 

night as we walked I was surprised (tho' not much 
so) by his unfolding his intentions in actually 
making me an overture of Marriage. As yet I 
have neither encouraged nor refused him^ but 
shall most likely do the latter very soon^ tho' I 
am not fully determined on that point. He 
certainly is attached to me^ his actions have long 
evinced it. I admire him when he tells me he 
wants none of my money. Is he not very disin- 
terested ? 1 have only one objection to him — he 
is not clever enough for me. I am fond of him as 
a friend^ but cannot be perfectly satisfied with him. 

And there the chronicle^ as Cowley would call 
it^ ends^ and I know no more. I should like to 
read Betsy's reply, but there is no chance. 

The hearts of modern girls of seventeen and 
eighteen are a sealed book to me ; but I have 
a feeling that such cautious pluralism is not 
much in their way just now. And yet I may 
be all w:rong. 



III. — The Enthusiast 

It is a somewhat debatable point whether it 
is better to have no critical faculty, and think 
the second-rate first-rate, or to be fastidiously 
made and take pleasure from the best only. Of 
course, if things are not what they are, but what 
we think they are, each type has the same delight 
88 



The Latest Find 

in the presence of an accepted treasure,, although^ 
of course^ the delight must come far oftener to 
him whose judgment is bad than to him whose 
judgment is good. In so far^ then^ as quantity 
of delight is concerned^ the bad judge has the 
better time^, but I suspect that the quality of 
delight experienced by the good judge, when he 
does feel it^ compensates him. I suspect that 
both men are equally happy. 

To this train of thought I was led by meeting 
in a narrow lane^ yesterday^ my neighbour^ a 
young amateur farmer, on his horse, and his 
asking ine to look in and examine his latest 
acquisition. For without a jot of knowledge 
he has enough smattering of information con- 
cerning painters and engravers and the titles 
of books to lead him to be always trying to 
^^ pick Lip " bargains in the way of sporting 
prints, and so forth, and always to be swindled ; 
and I am called in to pronounce on the bargain 
— entirely, I may say, without qualification to 
do so. 

He stopped me to say that he had just picked 
up a Thomas Sidney Cooper and would I look at it. 
^^ If it's as good as I think,'' he said, '^^it's a 
small fortune for me, isn't it?" I stroked his 
horse's neck. ^^ Isn't it?" I whistled my dog 
in. ^^ Well, come and see it, any way," he said ; 



Simple Souls 

^'but I've always heard that Thomas Sidney 
Coopers are worth any money." 

In tlie evening I walked up to the farm and 
was shown the picture and saw at once that 
Thomas Sidney Cooper never painted it. I never 
thought he had^ for my friend has no luck. The 
last bargain he asked me to look at was a series 
of hunting prints by Alken^ which he w^as con- 
vinced were the original aquatints. He had paid 
for them on that supposition^ I fear. But they 
were not. They were recent productions^ printed 
from the old plates, no doubt^ but coloured within 
the past few years. My friend is the natural 
prey of the ingenious artificers who spend their 
time in imitations. But^ as I said to him^ ^^What 
does it matter if you like them .^ " And he does 
like them. They hang round his walls and give 
him the utmost pleasure — or nearly so. I suppose 
he would be a little more pleased if he knew that 
they also represented money. 

When I told him that it was certainly not a 
Thomas Sidney Cooper (in spite of the artist's 
name in full upon it), his face fell^ it is true, 
for a moment, but he bravely pulled himself 
together the minute after, and said with feel- 
ing, ^^ Well, they're damned good cows any 
way, and I like *em ! Cooper w^asn't the only 
painter." 

90 



Ideas in Conflict 

IV. — The Incomplete Mind 

F is a talker so famous for his disconnec- 
tions^ his unjoined flats of speech^ that it has 
become the custom of certain of his companions 
to carry surreptitious notebooks in which to 
preserve these flowers. '^^A cuckoo/' one such 
anthology begins^ ^^does not lay his own eggs." 
That remark is quite understandable ; one sees 
the idea^ indeed_, at the first blush. One hardly 
detects error ; yet you could not have a much 
better example of the workings of an incomplete 
mind ; or rather it is a double mind that commits 
these pleasant errors^ to which Ireland stands, 
and will standi as the fatherland : a mind that, 
even as it begins to speak, is possessed by two 
ideas w^hich, striving each to be the first to find 
utterance, confound each other in their egress. 
A kind of mental stammering. 

The two ideas fight very visibly in the example 
that follows. They are : (l) You believe every- 
thing you hear ; and (2) you repeat mechanically 
everything you hear. Those wxre the two things 

that F wished to say ; but in the struggle 

that ensued at the doorway of his mind this blend 
was evolved : — 

You believe everything that is crammed down 
your throat, just like a parrot. 

91 



Simple Souls 

Here are others : — 

No squirrel can support himself in the air unless 
he has a tree. 

I believe no statement unless it is supported 
by my own handwriting. 

No camel will dare cross a river that he hasn't 
been across before. 

Did you really say that to him ? If anybody 
else had said it he w^ould have kicked you 
downstairs. 

The following statement is based on the 
soundest^ knowledge of physics applied to 
ordinary life, and is as clear as day to the 
speaker ; but how imperfectly conveyed to the 
listener — 

If you want to get into a tramcar you should 
run in the opposite direction. 

Another : — 

If Smith had not been born he would not have 
been Smith. 

One can see Coleridge sitting down to four good 
hours' monologue on that tremendous saying. 
Odd how the incomplete minds stumble on 
metaphysical profundity. 

And here is a final example, which calls for 
wet towels and sedatives ; — 

I never said it was easier for a rich man to go 
92 



A Lover 

through the eye of a needle than for a camel to 
enter the Kmgdom of Heaven. What I said was 
the exact opposite. 

There are materials of a good discussion here. 
What is the exact opposite ? I recommend the 
question to hungry debating societies that are 
tired of Tariff Reform. 



V. — Middle Age 

" I have been to Drury Lane pantomime only 
once/' the German waiter^ who had become con- 
fidential^ said to me. ^^ It was before I was 
married^ and I took my girl. My girl^ who is 
shorty could not see^ and I let her stand on my 
feet all the evening. She kept saying that she 
was sure it hurt me^ but I said it didn't. It did 
though^ and the next day I could hardly walk. 
... I would not do that now. Not that I do not 
love my wife^ but I would not do that now.'' 

VI. — Mary Guilhermin 

Mary Guilhermin was — who ? I have no notion. 
All that I know of her is gathered from the title- 
page of a quaint book which has been making me 
laugh : A Series of Letters, by Mary Guilhermin, 
1766. It is impossible not to be amused by any 
93 



Simple Souls 

collection of model letters^ whether for children 
or for grown-up persons ; but Mary Guilhermin's 
are better even than most. The year was an 
early one^ and that in itself makes for humour 
in such matters ; her mind was early ^ too. The 
book, I might say, was intended to serve a 
double purpose, for a French translation of each 
letter is appended, so that while the youthful 
subjects of George in. were learning to address 
each other and their parents politely and with 
grace, they were learning the language of diplo- 
macy as well. 

Guilhermin has a French smack to it, and it is 
possible that Mary, herself English, had married 
an instructor in that tongue. I do not think she 
can have been a native of Gaul, or she would 
have had an instinct w^arning her that small boys 
neither do write nor should write as her manual 
wishes. And yet — was she married } Would a 
Frenchman, even a teacher of his tongue, marry 
a w^oman of such curious and incorrigible a 
density ? People, however, marry for strange 
reasons. Handsome I can conceive her to have 
been, with a kind of statuesque placidity — a foil 
to M. Guilhermin's mercurial restlessness. But 
this is the idlest speculation. Better to read the 
letters. 

Behold how the small Georgian boy (perhaps 
94 



Model Letters 

your great-great-great-grandfather) was taught 
by Mary Guilhermin to feUcitate with his mother 
on being furnished by her with a sister : — 

Dear Mamma. — I received with the highest 
pleasure an account of your happy recovery 
after the birth of a new sister. The man tells 
me she is reckoned very pretty. I long to see 
and drink a cup of caudle with her. I hope good 
mamma will grant me that indulgence ; other- 
wise I shall think the new come baby has put 
my nose out of joint and withdrawn your affection 
for your once favourite and 

Ever Dutiful Son 

The surprising thing is that this boy anticipates 
only a sip of caudle. Boys usually want money^ 
and I regret to say that Mary Guilhermin aids 
them in their demands,, the suspicion that it is 
not well for children to ask for presents never 
having crossed her mind. Here are examples 
of discreet and tactful (horribly tactful) applica- 
tions for coin as drawn up by her simple pen : — 

Dear Mamma^ — I am much obliged to papa and 
you for thinking on me ; the taylor toc»k measure 
of me yesterday^ and promises me my new suit by 
next Sunday. I shall examine every pocket in 
hopes of finding a blessing from dear mamma ; 
whose tenderness and spirit^ I am persuaded, will 
not permit her to let her son appear less than 
others, as my school-fellows are indulged for good 

95 



Simple Souls 

behaviour to go next week with our mistress and 
see a play exhibited by some strollers in the next 
village ; we have had an account of its being very 
merry and entertaining. Every one is intent on 
the promised diversion^ and I hope you will not 
disappoint the proposed pleasure of 

Your affectionate and dutiful Son 

The second appeal for pocket-money is perhaps 
rather better based : — 

Dear Papa^ — I would not acquaint you with 
my having begun the rule of three, till I was 
sure I could state a sum. I know all my fore- 
going rules perfectly, which my master is ready 
to attest, as he has taken great pains to ground 
me in them. I hope therefore I shall not offend, 
if I beg leave to draw upon you for the half-crown 
you were so kind to promise me for every rule I 
entered into. Schoolboys are always poor, and 
that sum will be an estate to 

Your dutiful Son 

Mary Guilhermin knew all the difficulties of 
life. Here, for example, is a formula for that 
most desirable of epistolary wiles, an excuse for 
not writing. It is very ingenious, and might have 
taken papa in : — 

Dear Papa, — Give me leave to assure you my 
neglect of writing every month has not proceeded 
from any levity or a slighting of your commands, 
but for these six weeks past 1 have been so 

96 



The Boy and the Sermon 

afflicted with a whitlow on my thumbs that I 
could not form a letter; it is just healed^ and I 
am certain my bad writing will too plainly prove 
that I am not yet free from pain^ though willing 
to take the earliest opportunity of subscribing 
myself^ dear papa^ 

Your very dutiful Son 

But the gem of the correspondence is the last^ 
in which Mary Guilhermin's model boy tells his 
father about yesterday's sermon. This letter is 
at once her triumph and her defeat. The 
wickedest mocker could not_, if he set himself 
to it^ produce a more complete example of what 
a healthy bo}^ should not write to his father : — 

Dear Papa^ — Yesterday^ after an agreeable 
walk of half a mile to our parish churchy I was 
inspired with a truly unaffected zeal to join in 
that well composed form of prayer contained in 
our church liturgy^ expressed in so audible^ so 
solemn^ so easy an elocution^ so emphatic^ with- 
out the least tincture of pedantry^ that the divine 
proved to his congregation he was sensible that 
he was addressing the Supreme Beings w^hich dis- 
penses happiness to mankind^ and inspired every- 
one with a real fervency to join in prayer and 
thanksgiving to our Creator. When he mounted 
the pulpit^ his grave deportment drew the atten- 
tion of old and young. His subject^ on the 
reciprocal duties between parents and children^ 
warmed one with a lively gratitude for your kind 
nurture of me from tender infancy till now. 
G 97 



Simple Souls 

Every duty he mentioned that is required from 
the parent I was persuaded you had performed 
in regard to me^ and upon examination^ finding 
myself too often deficient in my past^ have re- 
solved to amend past errors^ and by an uniform 
good behaviour pro\ e myself to be your 

Grateful and Faithful Son 

Papa's reply is not given. I should enjoy 
writing it for him. 



VII. — The Patriot 

She was not the landlady of the inn but 
the landlady's elderly unmarried sister^ and she 
lingered in my room at every meal to talk about 
the village,, its beauties and its glories. One of 
those simple souls w^ho without affectation really 
do find their happiness in the happiness of others 
and their grief in the grief of others. Not being, 
like her bustling querulous sister, the wife of 
the landlord, her mind had retained its poetry, 
although imagination was not united to it. It 
seemed as if she could not really believe in the 
existence elsewhere of any of the phenomena 
of spring : as if the birds reserved their singing 
and flowers their blossoming for her village alone. 
She laid no dish upon my table without extolling 
it as the best of its kind — since it was grown 

98 



Pride of Place 

ther^e ; and the rain, that chilled me to the bone 
and had come in consequence under criticism, 
was to her a beneficence, in that it would nourish 
the asparagus, for which her village was famous, 
and the broccoli tops, without which no meal 
then was complete. 

Pride does not often lead to gentleness, but in 
her case pride of place had clone so, for so 
jealous was she of the neighbourhood's good 
fame that she could forgive all lapses ; so that, 
had an earthquake shaken its church to the 
ground, I can almost hear her saying : " Ah, but 
could there be in all England a belfry tower that 
would fall so beautifully or look so pretty in 
ruins ? " Or if lightning killed the vicar, she 
w^ould find a moment's breath in which to admire 
the beauty of the flash — ^^ Such flashes as you 

get only at ." 

I cannot tell you the name of the village, 
because we must keep a few quiet places to 
ourselves in these hard days, but I will giwQ you a 
light, as the acrostic people say. In the church- 
yard is a sundial of curiously carved stone — a 
sundial unique in my experience and wonderful 
(I am beginning to talk like the lady of the inn), 
in that it has five dials on it. The figures, how- 
ever, have been for years illegible, and the 
gnomons are broken. The squire's very beautiful 
99 



Simple Souls 

park adjoins the churchyard^ and his fine old grey 
Jacobean house is within a stone's throw ; and a 
wxek or so ago (although he is over seventy) he 
bought a motor-car^ and delights in it greatly. 
Now I know he is a good man^ because of this 
and that which I heard in the village^ and 
because his workpeople look happy^ and because 
his grandchildren playing about in the park look 
happy^ and because there is a dazzling peacock 
usually on the top of his red fruit wall^ and from 
various other indications^ including his readiness 
to let footpaths cross his estates. The vicar^ too^ 
is a good man^ I conjecture^ because he has a 
very loving little black spaniel^ and during my 
visit two lambs were being brought up by 
hand in his kitchen. Yet both the squire and 
the vicar have allowed that very interesting and 
beautiful sundial^ with its five dials — which 
might be a liberal education in science to 
the village — to remain useless from year to year^ 
when I suppose a five-pound note would 
put it right in a week : less money than the 
squire's first breakdown in his car will cost him^ 
less money than the vicar gave for the bicycle 
I saw him riding. 

This is a thing that bothers me : how 
men of culture^ with responsibilities to their 
village_, can keep from action in cases like that. 

lOO 



The Sundial 

The local patriot at the iim would not waste much 
time^ had she the povver^ in writing for an expert 
to be sent down to reinstate this old-world 
monolith afresh and set it once again in interested 
and affectionate bondage to the sun. For she 
has pride of place. But she has with it no 
money. 



101 



The Dealer >^z^ ^^ ^^ ^:^ ^^ 

T T AVING vainly spent the whole afternoon in 
trying to get a single swing of the 
pendulum^ a single note of the gong^ a single 
tick — the least sign of life — out of a clock that 
I bought a few clays ago at ojr old curiosity 
shop^ I ought not to be in any mood to extol the 
dealer who sold it to me. And yet I am. I hold 
him in much honour_, even although he vowed he 
had just paid five shillings to have it put into 
^^ thorough going order." I give his w^ords 
verbatim. They are w^ords which are invented 
for such men to run glibly off their false and 
irresponsible tongues. From no man does the 
phrase come more pat. ^'Thorough going order." 
By this warranty the breed may be said to live. 

Yet the clock shall hang where it is for ever, 
so far as I am concerned, for I like it and shall 
soon be reconciled to its apathy and discretion. 
Why tell the time ? Silence is golden. Also, 

I02 



Luck 

whenever I see strangers looking up at it^ 1 
shall recall Fred Barnard's exquisite picture of 
the country lad holding a stable lantern over 
a sundial on a dark night. They will be as 
likely to get information as he. 

Besides^ it serves me right for buying a clock 
at all^ when clocks and watches are always against 
me and always will be. I have never been lucky 
with them. Some people^ I have observed^ never 
are ; just as others always are. For luck is a 
streaky business : you can easily be a lucky 
man^ and yet have no luck with clocks, say, 
or tailors or roses or Blue Persian cats ; and 
you can be lucky with these things and unlucky 
in others. I have a friend who is and always 
has been lucky with tailors — his clothes fit at 
once, and are well cut, and last a long time, 
and look well to the end, and his house is full 
• of interesting and accurate timepieces — and yet 
he has bad health, and his eyes have lately given 
him trouble. You see ? So I do not worry very 
much about my uniform difficulties with every 
timepiece I buy and have bought since the first. 

Did I use the word timepiece ? If I did, it was 
fate, for my first horological tragedy belongs to 
that unhappy euphemism. At school I took 
in (as who did not in those days ? ) a boys' 
periodical. I forget its name, but it had ad- 
103 



The Dealer 

vertisements of such fascination that long after 
the text proper had been read and re-read we 
would be seen poring over the end pages. I 
need only remark that one page was devoted 
to the magical firm of Theobald to convince the 
initiated of this allurement- (To-day there is^ 
I believe^ no Theobald. No Theobald ! What 
can it be like to be a boy without a Theobald ? 
Welcome^ grey hairs ! ) But to return. In 
addition to Theobald's advertisement^ I came, 
one w^eekj upon a description of a treasure 
which I felt that I must possess or die. A 
^^ jewelled timepiece." Now, I had no watch, 
but almost all the other boys, even my contem- 
poraries, had ; and here w^as my chance. A 
jewelled and accurate timepiece for half a crown, 
postage free. Such an offer to-day would be 
unexciting; but in 1878 there were no Water- 
burys : a w^atch w^as of silver, and it cost a 
pound or two. I forget the rest of the advertise- 
ment, but it was all intensely appetising, and 
I suspected nothing. Not even did the word 
timepiece cause a tremor. By dint of saving, 
self-denial, borrowing, and some small sacrifices 
of articles of vertii from my collection, I scraped 
together the necessary half-crown, and received in 
return a — pocket sundial. It w^as my first experi- 
ence of the commercial art of harnessing the truth 
104 



Idlesse Oblige 

to a lie. For there was not a word in the adver- 
tisement that was not exact — there w^as even a 
bad ruby under the compass — and yet^ taken as a 
whole^ it was a deception. At any rate^ had the 
word sundial been used instead of timepiece not a 
dozen half-crow^ns would have resulted. 

That was the first of my failures,, and they still 
continue. I have a repeating watch so delicately 
organised that if I sneeze it stops. My ordinary 
watch is better ; it keeps good time ; but its 
gold is of so suspicious a hue^ so like the sham 
article^ although in reality rather costly^ that 
no pawnbroker will advance more than an eighth 
of its value. Luck never changes in matters 
like this. General luck may change, but not 
particular luck. I shall measure time badly until 
the end. 

No secondhand dealer in the country — in a 
small way, I mean, — ever began by being a 
secondhand dealer. Like the conductors of 
omnibuses they drift to it by devious routes, 
through other trades, carried by the current of 
laissez J aire or reluctance to obey the ordinary 
rules governing commercial success. For whereas 
a grocer or cobbler or carpenter would suffer if he 
were not in when he was wanted, w^ould inevitably 
perish had he not some respect for the working 
hours, a secondhand furniture dealer loses nothing. 



The Dealer 

There is always a wife to name the price while 
he is enjoying the delights of hunting for new 
treasure and giving far too little for it. Hence 
from unpunctual and unbusinesslike tradesmen 
and craftsmen good dealers can be evolved. My 
dealer can do everything, I am told, ^^ except" — 
as he himself put it with engaging frankness — 
^^ work " ; but his real trade is that of gunsmith. 
Had he stuck to that trade, I gather, the rabbits 
round here would be immortal. 

My dealer is typical. He is, first and fore- 
most, lazy. I believe that that is a necessity. 
To keep an old curiosity shop in a country town 
one must have some of the gift of indolence that 
once wxnt with tobacconists and newsagents. A 
readiness to gossip belongs also to the trade, and 
a touch of the artist. My dealer is much of an 
artist. He is rarely without a cigarette ; he has 
a suspicion of French blood. He is careless. 
^^Take it or leave it," he seems to say. He 
recommends his wares, it is true, and he recom- 
mends them (as I have shown) so fluently that 
his tongue runs away with him. But he never 
overdoes his solicitation, and he has the good 
sense to leave you alone in the shop and let you 
make your own discoveries. They all ought to 
do this ; but how few^ of them have the wit to ! 

I never come to a new village or country tow^n 
io6 



A Problem 

without exploring the curiosity shop ; and I have 
never yet made what is called a real find^ or^ in 
other words^ I have never^ owing to the dealer's 
ignorance^ bought for a few shillings an article 
worth as many pounds. Nor^ to be quite frank, 
do I want to ; but stories of such strokes of 
fortune are always interesting. Nor have I ever 
bought for a small sum anything of value from 
a farmhouse or cottage while waiting for the rain 
to stop, a coup that I am even less anxious to 
bring off than that other. But I often wonder 
what I should do if I found myself in a room of 
this kind, on the w^all of which was, say, a genuine 
Turner drawing. To its owners, I am assuming, 
it w^ould be of far less interest than a good colour 
print. While five pounds would delight them, 
to me it would be an endless joy. If I offered 
them more than five pounds they would become 
suspicious, hang back, ask advice of a lawyer or 
some one, and get perhaps a hundred pounds, 
while the adviser w^ould make a thousand, and in 
the end the picture would cross the Atlantic and 
hang in the gallery of a Trust magnate. To save 
it from such a fate, might I not stifle my 
conscience and walk off with it in exchange for 
five pounds } I wonder if I would. 

An interesting occupation in a curiosity shop 
is to speculate on the homes from which these 
107 



The Dealer 

thousand and one things have come — to meet 
here^ in this quiet country town. There is a 
sinister poem by the second James Thomson on 
the conversation between the pieces of furniture 
in a dead man's room ; the same treatment, 
applied to an old curiosity shop, by an Andersen, 
would produce the most fascinating results — a 
series of life stories of East and West (emphatically 
meeting here) that would hold a child spellbound 
for hours. That little Burmese idol should have 
something to tell ; that dried head from South 
America ; that group of Dresden china ; even 
that sturdy old jug with a sailor and his lass 
bidding farewell on it. It may have stood on 
Mrs. Poyser's dresser. ... In a curiosity shop 
everything has a history. . . . Mr. Kipling could 
do it. 

The other old furniture and curiosity dealer 
within reach is an older man, who has made that 
business not his staff, but his cane. His staff is a 
barber's pole ; and many is the chin that has 
been left half-lathered and impotent to protest 
while he answered a call to name the price of a 
Chippendale chair or brass fender. His tongue 
is long, too, but not so engaging as the ex- 
gunsmith's. The last time I saw him he was not 
himself at all, and confessed to a recent stroke 
that had not only incapacitated his shaving hand, 
io8 



The Paralytic's Wile 

but also had affected his eyes. But it is a poor 
dealer who cannot get some profit out of even a 
visitation of paralysis ; and when I asked the 
price of a pair of candlesticks^ he requested me to 
be so good as to look underneath and read the 
figure out to him^ and on my doing so he 
remarked_, with an air of amazement that could 
not have been better managed by an actor^ ^^ That 
must be a mistake. My son could never have 
been so foolish as to mark them as low as that on 
purpose. It all comes of my illness. But/' he 
added sadly, ^'^ since the price is there, I suppose 
you must have the benefit of it " ; and who 
could refrain from buying after such a generous 
sentiment ? And who could refrain from admir- 
ation of the old man's ingenuity on hearing 
from others a description of the same ruse and 
its success with themselves ? 

When I was last at my own particular 
dealer's this is w^hat I remember seeing : Four 
lantern clocks ; two alabaster figures representing 
Titian's Sacred and Profane Love — there being 
little to choose in matter of physical development 
between these tw^o opposed varieties ; a pencil 
drawing nominally by George Morland ; a^ bundle 
of coloured sporting prints, so obviously spurious 
that the dealer's assurance that they were 
genuine died in his moustache, and nothing 
109 



The Dealer 

became it like its end ; a grandfather's clock ; 
two carved chests ; a brass pestle and mortar ; 
some coloured engravings on glass ; several plate 
warmers ; fom* Sussex-iron fire-backs ; a spinning 
wheel ; and an oil painting of the Holy Family, 
which the dealer could not say for certain^ but 
rather fancied, was by Leonardo da Vinci. This I 
might have, he said, for three pound ten ; thereby 
reminding me of an oil painting that a friend of 
mine saw in a marine store off the Edgware Road 
not long since, very black all over, and unframed, 
across whose surface was written in chalk these 
words : ^^ This genuine old master, probably worth 
<£100, for 8s.'^ I did not buy the Leonardo; 
I bought only the clock, and that refuses to go. 

At the other pole, distant the diameter of the 
earth from my dealer's, is that spacious and 
palatial treasury of old furniture which we will 
call Billsons', that paradise of the connoisseur, 
with its miles of galleries, situated in an old 
English country town, with carriages-and-pairs 
and wagonettes and dogcarts in the High Street, 
and, in spite of the motor-cars that pass through, 
a last-century, or even century-before-last, air 
still clinging to it. The High Street is very 
steep, and Billsons' is half-way up it — or half- 
way down it, according to the direction in which 
you are going. At the foot is a river, and therk 
no 



Billsons' 

the hill instantly begins again. (Have I told 
you enough to identify it ?) 

Billsons' has a modest enough window^ like 
any other old furniture shop ; its bewildering 
and unending ramifications^ floor upon floor and 
rooms leading into rooms^ are all at the back. 
The things therefore_, to do is to get to the 
back, and this is possible to the honest daylight 
adventurer only by first passing an assistant in 
the shop. Now_, as all lovers of art and the 
second-hand know_, the difference in interest 
between exploring show^-rooms and picture ex- 
hibitions alone^ and being accompanied by an 
assistant,, is the difference between pleasure and 
anxiety. Therefore, the thing to do is not only 
to get plausibly into the back of Ellisons', but 
to get there alone. And this is just where 
Billsons' is ready to help you, for if it thinks 
you look all right, it lets you go free as a bee 
in a herbaceous border. All you have to do^ 
therefore, is to look all right. 

The prevailing word at Billsons* is ^' piece. '^ 
You are urged to consider the charms of this 
piece, the rarity of that, the remarkable qualities 
of a third. ^^ Pax vobiscum '' (to make a very 
poor pun) might be the motto of the firm. 

Billsons' not only a little overworks the word 
^^ piece,'' but indulges in adjectives to an extent 
III 



The Dealer 

beyond necessity. For instance^ one can under- 
stand a dealer employing all the aid of alluring 
epithets during the progress of' the deal and 
dropping it when the bargain is completed. 
Not so Billsons'. Billsons' carries the habit into 
its accounts. Of the dead^ so to speak, it 
continues to say agreeable things. Thus, in the 
receipted bill which lies before me, the result 
of my temerarious travels on many floors, I find 
that I have paid for a ^^ pretty " wine-cooler, a 
^'^very pretty" cradle, and a ^'^ quaint " decanter 
stand. Since they are now mine and no longer 
Billsons' they might equally well be a plain 
wine-cooler, cradle, and decanter stand. But no, 
Billsons' sticks to its adjectives to the bitter 
end, and I admire it for doing so. 

Three pieces, you will observe, I bought ; but 
what of the rest — the thousands of pieces I did 
not buy ? The very handsome upright bullet 
clock ; the quaint and commodious bacon settle, 
with its many friendly cupboards ; the unusual 
monk's combined bench and table ; the very 
elegant fire-screens that might easily have kept 
the heat of the flames from the face of Miss 
Jane Austen as she sat reading to her mother ; 
and so forth. What of these ? Well, they are 
not for me ; but how an American millionaire 
visiting Billsons', as many of them do, can come 

112 



Old Furniture's Lure 

away without spending hundreds and hundreds 
of pounds^ I shall never understand. If I had 
wealth I should be a perfect spendthrift with 
old furniture. Nothing gives me so deep and 
serene a satisfaction as sound and beautiful 
pieces — furniture that was already old when 
Albert the Good arrived on our shores with his 
devastating want of taste. But wealth is never 
to be mine^ and I shall never have the furniture 
1 want. If, however^ I behave myself and 
respect the Decalogue^ when I die I shall go 
to Billsons'. 



113 



**Ginnett*s" ^ ^ .-> e> ^^ 

T WONDER what connotation the word 
^^ Giniiett's" — which was in my early years the 
most magical word in the vocabulary — has for 
most of the readers of this book. Probably none 
at all. To me^ however^ it stood and stands for 
everything which to London children of a century 
ago was conveyed by the intoxicating name of 
Astley, and to provincial and village children in 
the favoured districts to-day is conveyed by the 
name of Sanger. For Ginnett's Circus (the ^^ g" is 
soft) near Park Crescent^ Brighton^ was the only 
place of entertainment permitted to us by parental 
law^ and to visit it was to come nearer the highest 
felicity than I have ever been since. That was 
thirty and more years ago. Brighton has no 
circus to-day^ but a " Hippodrome " with two 
music-hall performances nightly. Such are the 
stones that this generation is glad to swallow in 
exchange for the old nutritious bread ! 
114 



The Flemish Hercules 

The Ginnetts (I assure you it is almost impos- 
sible to write^ for I can smell the warm tan and 
sawdust at this moment) were an interesting race. 
The founder was one of Napoleon's soldiers^ who 
carried^ not a marshal's baton_, but a tent-pole, in 
his knapsack, and directly the wars were over 
joined the great Andrew Ducrow at Lyons. 
Andrew was the son of Peter Ducrow, the 
^^ Flemish Hercules/' one of whose feats was to 
lie on his back and support a platform on 
which negligently huddled eighteen grenadiers. 
Another was to hold in his teeth a table covered 
with his children, most illustrious and capable of 
whom was certainly Andrew, who from the age 
of three was trained rigorously to tumble, vault, 
dance on the tight-rope, ride bareback, and in 
fact become a circus utility man in the highest 
sense of the phrase. The boy developed a com- 
mercial instinct as well as terrific muscles, and 
succeeded where his father failed, becoming 
the most famous circus proprietor in England at 
a time when circuses were popular, and leaving a 
fortune of £60,000. Him, as I have said, Ginnett 
loere, home from the wars, joined at Lyons, later 
accompanying him to England, and making and 
saving money so industriously that he was able to 
start a travelling show of his own — the first 
^^ Ginnett's Circus." 

115 



" Ginnett's " 

The soldier had three sons, John, Fred, and 
George, who recently died, and whose death 
has suggested these reminiscences ; and each of 
them became circus proprietors too, and carried 
the fear of wild animals over the country. 
John's menagerie came to grief in Morecambe 
Bay ; but Fred and George, save for a fire now 
and then, did well, George having his head- 
quarters at Bristol and Fred at Brighton. Of 
Fred's beginnings I can tell nothing, although, 
as will be seen later, I ought to be the first 
authority on them, but the foundation of George's 
success was a timely gift of c£lOO from an admiring 
spectator of his tumbling. This sum he managed 
with such skill that it made him a capitalist, and 
his circuses came to be known all over England, 
France, and India. The last time I saw one of 
them was in a field at Chichester, in, I think, 1903. 

But it was brother Fred's circus (I can hear the 
thud of the hoofs against the wooden ring) that 
I knew as I shall never know another, and it 
was Fred's dashing sons, Claude and Fred and 
Albert, who were the heroes of my youngest 
days. The old man had given up appearing in 
the ring, except in the kindly character, at 
Christmas time, of distributor of the prizes on 
those special nights on which the programmes 
were transformed into lottery tickets, and one 
ii6 



Dick Turpin's Ride 

was in danger of suddenly becoming the owner 
of a live sucking pig, or a leg of mutton^ or a 
goose, or a bottle of wine. The programmes^ I 
remember^ weve scented^ and I still believe theirs 
to be the most exquisite perfume that is distilled ; 
but I have never met it since. 

And his sons ! There was nothing they could 
not do : and I have even detected their pacred 
lineaments under the chalk and paint of the 
acrobatic clowns. Claude's great feat^ however^ 
was the impersonation of Dick Turpin in his ride 
to York on the blackest of Black Besses^ with 
circumstances of humour and effrontery at the 
gate-houses on the road^ and an end too sad to 
think of even now. Fred^ who in those days had 
a handsome^ imperious^ spoiled face_, was the 
dashing exponent of the jockey act^ in which he 
at once flung away saddle and bridle with a fine 
contempt^ rode perilously on the horse's very tail^ 
and ended^ amid a fusillade of whip cracks and 
shouts from the whole company^ massed at the 
entrances for the purpose^ in leaping to the ani- 
mal's highly resined back and rushing round the 
ring imperturbably, with arms folded^ at an angle 
of forty-five degrees. Great days ! Great nights ! 

Albert is less vivid in my memory — he was^ if 
1 remember aright^ less of a centaur than the 
others ; a cynical humorist of the ring^ with songs 
117 



" Giiinett's " 

and recitations and caustic jests on life ; but 
Madame Ginnett^ the stepmother of this dazzling 
triumvirate^ her I can see at this moment with 
the utmost distinctness as^ in an immaculate 
riding-habit^ she put a proud and pawing stallion 
through the paces of the Haute Ecole^ gracefully 
inclining her tall hat to applause that, as is often 
the case with this particular performance, was 
almost too well regulated. What a mother to 
have ! I used to think as I sat there. What a 
father ! How different from my own. 

I speak now of the early eighteen-seventies. 
Fifteen years later, when old Fred Ginnett, 
having given up his Park Crescent circus, was 
building another, more in the centre of Brighton 
— a forlorn hope, as it turned out, for the county 
towns of England by that time had become 
utterly sophisticated, and the canker of variety 
entertainments and melodramatic sensations had 
eaten into their vitals and ruined their appetite 
for the simpler and nobler fare of the ring — 
fifteen years later I met my ancient hero face to 
face and had a long talk with him on more or 
less level terms. We met by appointment, for 
the suggestion had been made to him that his 
career was worth putting into narrative form and 
I was the Boswell to do it. He was a thick-set 
little foreign-looking man, w^ith a weather-beaten 
ii8 



The Ring 

red face and very prominent eyes. He wore a 
tall hat on the back of his head^ and a long over- 
coat almost to his feet, with an astrachan collar, 
and he held a cigar in fat ringed fingers. He 
buttonholed me in the middle of his arena for an 
hour or so, and told me story after story of his 
life, as specimen bricks, so to speak, of the 
biographical edifice w^hich he had contemplated. 
But they did not go well into another man's 
prose : at least, they would not go into mine. 
My ancient hero told them with spirit and an 
immense chuckling appreciation, but it was not 
transitive ; the laughter was in the first teller. 
And so the project dropped; but had the whole 
family come under toll, I have no doubt I could 
have made from them a real book, and perhaps 
have fixed the circus temperament. 

Fred Ginnett died soon after, and now George 
has gone. And they died none too soon, for 
their old and romantic profession had come upon 
evil days, and horses, by which they lived, are 
under a cloud. Peace to their ashes ! Whether 
or not Claude and Albert have circuses of their 
own to maintain the magic name, I do not know ; 
but from time to time I see the name of the 
younger Fred on music-hall posters. So does the 
glory depart, and so dangerous and disillusioning 
is it to grow up ! 

119 



Dr. Blossom .^ ^:> <:><::> .^ 

" '^T^HE paper/' said Dr. Blossom_, his spectacles 
positively glinting with satisfaction^ ^^ has 
been carefully planned to meet a long-felt want. 
I have given immense thought to the matter. 
Look for yourself." 

He handed me a copy. 

^^ But first/' he said^ " I ought^ perhaps^ to tell 
you how it originated. You must know that 
before I retired and entered upon the present 
scheme, I had a very extensive practice in a 
great Flat centre of London. Where there are 
flats^ as you may have observed^ there are babies ; 
for flats are largely the homes of those delightful 
people^ on Sundays and in the evenings rarely seen 
apart^ whom we refer to as young couples." 

The old gentleman's spectacles again glistened 
with goodwill to man as he said these words. 

^^ I suppose/' he continued_, ^^ I have had 
during the past ten years an average of three 

I20 



The Young Mothers 

births a week^ almost all in a square mile of 
mansion s_5 and many of them^ a great proportion 
of them^ first children." 

His glasses glistened again. 

^^Ah/' he went on^ ^^it is the first children 
that count ! " 

He sighed. 

^'^And this/' he said^ '^^ brings me to my point. 
My point is that no matter what the ordinary 
person says^ whether it is the father or the 
father-in-law^ the mother or the mother-in-law^ 
the nurse or the doctor^ or any one else : no 
matter who it is that speaks^ or what the super- 
latives that are employed, no hahy is admired 
sufficiently to j)lease the mother. There^ sir^ you 
have the kernel of the whole matter.'' 

I agreed. 

^' In my large practice/' Dr. Blossom con- 
tinued^ ^^I naturally observed this difficulty — 
indeed^ it was forced upon me daily^ for with all 
my endeavours I also have constantly fallen short 
of what is expected of me ; and when_, the other 
day^ I retired^ I determined to spend my leisure 
in doing what I could to make those poor 
famished young mothers happier. 1 would^ I 
said^ invent some method of praising their babies 
adequately^ or^ if not adequately — for tliat^ of 
course^, is impossible — more acceptably." 

121 



Dr. Blossom 

He pointed to the paper in my hand^ which as 
yet I had had no opportunity to open. 

^^ Now^ sir/' he said^ " you know the persistent 
fascination of ])rint. You know that in spite of 
all the myriad newspapers^ daily and weekly^ 
that now assail our peace ; in spite^ too^ of the 
fact that most of us are more or less intimately 
acquainted with some one who writes — so familiar 
with him^ indeed^ as to be contemptuous ; none 
the lessj no sooner does a things however trite^ 
get into prints than we approach it with a certain 
reverence. Our national scepticism disappears. 
We worship.' 

I agreed. 

*^Very well. If, I said to myself^ these poor 
young mothers are really to be made happy by 
the praise of their babies, those praises must 
be in print. They must be made public^ dis- 
tributed throughout the world. And that paper 
in your hand. The Babies' Review, was the 
result." 

He took the paper again and opened it. 

^^ I have chosen/' he said_, ^^as a model The 
Athenceum, and by what I hope is a pardonable 
fancy, I have likened the birth of a new child to 
the publication of a new book. Listen ! " And 
he read as follows in a rich, sympathetic 
voice : — 

122 



The Latest Publications 



^^NEW GIRLS 

^^ Givendoline Frances Wilkinson, who has just 
been published by Mrs. Wilkinson^ of 23 Milton 
Mansions^ Bedford Park^ is one of the most 
perfect works we ever remember to have seen. 
The style is simple but wholly effective, the 
utmost finish being given even to trifles. The 
keynote of the work is sweetness and placidity^ 
although a pleasant impression of something a 
little more positive is not lacking. The work is 
uniformly so healthy that a long life may con- 
fidently be hoped for it. England cannot have 
too much of this kind of boon. 

^^ There/' said Dr. Blossom^ ^^ that is the sort 
of thing. Here is another, under the heading, 
' The Latest Boys ' : — 

^^ From a young publishing firm named Love- 
bird, whose offices are at 14 Devonshire Mansions, 
Golder's Green, comes a new work in two volumes, 
entitled The Lovebird Twins. Both volumes are 
of a delicate pink with very soft edges, and both 
are extraordinarily interesting. Indeed, we find it 
impossible to express any preference, so alike are 
they in incident and charm. Perhaps Vol. II. is 
a little more vigorous than Vol. I. ; but then, on 
the other hand, Vol. I. is more reposeful than 
Vol. II. By a pleasant fancy a different name 
has been given to each, Vol. I. being known as 
^CyriL and Vol. II. as ^Aubrey.' What could be 
prettier } 

123 



Dr. Blossom 

'- I go in also^ like The Athencciim, for variety^ 
too. Here is another extract : — 

'' NEW PICTURES 

^-'We have just been favoured with the rare 
privilege of a private view of a perfect picture 
entitled^ ^ George Robert Brown son/ the work 
of one w^ho promises to be a gifted artist in this 
genre, Mrs. Brownson_, of 41 Rembrandt Buildings^ 
Battersea Park. As a first work her ^ George 
Robert Brownson ' is admirable. Indeed^ we can 
detect no fault. The colouring is very deep and 
rich_, and the moulding exquisite. The picture 
positively clamours for notice. 

^- There 1" said the proud editor. ^^ Wlien I 
tell you that portraits also are given^ you will 
agree with me that mothers have little to com- 
plain of. The portraits^ I admits a little impair 
the literary illusion; but I have got over that 
difficulty by calling them frontispieces. Here, 
for example, are Tlie Lovebird Twins, both 
volumes." 

He held up the paper, in which were the 
photographs of two portions of what Sir Walter 
Scott described as that species of dough which 
we call a fine baby. 

^^ You and me," said the doctor, ^^ that picture 
may leave cold. But exercise your imagination, 
my dear sir ; think of what it must mean to 
124 



A Little Gold-Mine 

Mrs. Lovebird to see it. I venture to say that 
there will be no happier woman in England 
to-moiTow^ which is the day of publication^ except 
perhaps Mrs. Brownson and Mrs. Wilkinson. 
The husbands^ too. Of course^ it is the fashion 
for husbands to say sarcastic things about their 
babies and pretend to be bored by the whole 
business ; but don't you believe it. If a well-read 
copy of this paper is not folded up in the pockets 
of Mr. Lovebird and Mr. Wilkinson and Mr. 
Brownson by Saturday next^ T will give fifty 
pounds to the Foundling Hospital. And think of 
the copies they will send away. I tell you_, sir^ 
this paper is a little gold-mine — a gold-mine of 
wealth and of happiness too." 
I shouldn't be surprised. 



12; 



Other People's Books <^ o ^z^ 

T^ ULOGIES of books are among the common- 
— ' places of all essayists ; but the books they 
eulogise are rarely the right ones. ^^ Among my 
Books " they entitle these embroideries^ or ^^ The 
Friends that Fail Not/' or ^^Inmy Library" — and 
then follow the pleasant praises of reading. But 
it is not true to the fact. The fact to be true to 
is_, that although we have books in plenty, it is 
the books of other people that give us our 
thrills. 

The poets also perpetuate this error. Mr. 
Dobson^ for example,, writes charmingly of his 
favourites on the unglazed shelves : the bulged 
and the bruised octavos^ the dear and the dumpy 
twelves ; and Mr. Dobson's disciples who pursue 
the same convention are many^ both here and in 
America^ where indeed book-loving in public is 
carried to a point that it has never reached in 
England, the possessors of treasured tomes 
126 



Naboth's Library 

caressing them in the broad light of day as if 
there were no such thing as shame at all. 

Illusions again ; for all the while^ of course, 
one's own books do not satisfy one in the least ; 
it is one's friends' books that one reads and really 
desires. 

This is the secret which no essayist and no poet 
has either ever discovered or has ever had sufficient 
courage to put into print : all the best books 
belong to other people. 

It is more than a secret^ it is a tragedy^ because 
do what one will one cannot have the same books 
as other people. If one were to go to a book- 
seller and lead him to a friend's house^ and say, 
^^ Spare no expense ; make me an exact repro- 
duction of this library/' he could not do it. 
Something would be missing. The next time 
one visited one's friend again^ one would see his 
latest acquisition, and it would be so desirable 
that it would take away the flavour of all the 
other books ; although as a matter of fact that 
would have gone already, because they had become 
one's own and no longer were another's. Naboth, 
you know, not only had a vineyard but was a 
great reader. Uriah the Hittite had a library as 
well as a wife. 

It is a strange world, and man is the strangest 
thing in it. Why, there are men who apologise 
127 



Other People's Books 

for being found looking at one's books ; who say^ 
'^ I hope you don't mind my glancing at your 
shelves ! " There are even men who ask leave 
before they look at one's pictures^ when^ to a 
large extent^ it is only that others may admire 
them that one has pictures at all. But here the 
subject becomes too painful. Other people's books 
one may write about with some lightness^ because 
other people's books (except first folios and such 
delicacies) can be duplicated and become one's 
own ; buB other people's paintings — there's tragedy 
there ! 

Another mystery is that there should be so 
many books of w hich one has never heard. 

" Where do other people find their books ? 
How do they hear of them ? " said a bookman the 
other day — a bookman beneath whose eyes tens 
of thousands of volumes must have passed in his 
time. Said he : ^^ There is a romantic and 
picturesque poet whom I visited recently in his 
home — I had almost written stronghold — enisled 
in the green pastures and woods of a thinly- 
populated county. I went to see himself and 
his natural surroundings and the beautiful 
creatures that he cherishes ; but what 1 chiefly 
remember is the fleeting glance of rows and rows 
of books w^hose titles even 1 had never heard of : 
books that it needed such a rare mind as his to 
128 



The Tenth Commandment 

bring together/' That is a common and very 
galling experience. Even the most recondite 
readers feel it ; even W. P. K feels it. 

There are even inns that have books that one 
wants — but there is no fixed rule iiere^ because 
inn libraries are not reflections of a personality 
but fortuitous aggregations of derelicts. '^ But 
I was once in an inn parlour/' said another reader 
recently, ^^ which had only three books, and one 
of them was the Poetical Works of Mr. Thomas 
Little, the quite amusing and improper amorous 
verses with which Moore began his career, and a 
rare volume. It is no longer in that inn parlour," 
he added. (Why are book-lovers so dishonest ?) 

I do not suggest that one has this covetous 
feeling in a public library, or in the British 
Museum Reading Room, or even in a bookshop. 
One may lack the books one sees there, but one 
does not covet them. The reason, I think, is 
that that which one is coveting in a friend's room 
as one looks at his shelves is not (if one only knew 
it) so much certain of his books as the tempera- 
ment that made certain of his books necessary 
to him. One is for the moment envious of his 
character. One wants the book because it is his ; 
one almost resents the circumstance that he 
should have had the wit or the sympathy to 
acquire that work. The cheek of the man ! 
I 129 



Other People's Books 

And yet even the automatic book-buyers have 
books that one wants — books to discontent one a 
little with one's own — although of course they 
have them in no such profusion as the genuine 
book-buyers. The modern series of reprints at 
a low figure have multiplied these mechanical 
fellows enormously. ^^ I was looking round the 
shelves of one such only last week/' remarked a 
third acquaintance talking on this topic, ^^and I 
found Friendship's Garland. He had never 
read it, he said, but ^ he liked to have all Arnold.' 
( What a man !) I have read it more than once, 
but for some reason or other I haven't a copy. 
Why haven't I a copy.^ What is the meaning of 
these amazing gaps ? I never did have a copy ; 
I borrowed it. But why haven't I a copy ? Wliy 
has that ass a copy while I haven't } I keep on 
asking the question because there is more in it 
than one supposes. There is a mystery in it." 

The answer is of course that a strange subter- 
ranean force arranges that we shall always be 
without many of the books we ought to have, and 
that our friends will have them instead. That is 
the answer. 



130 



The Enfranchised Reviewer ^> ^ 

I. — The Book of Christmas Delight 

IVT EVER (writes the reviewer at large,, — on the 
•*" ^ loose^ so to speak^ — allowed to choose his 
reading where he will instead of where an editor 
wills — ) never have I met with a work more strictly 
anonymous than the slender publication before 
me — 2i mere pamphlet in size^ and yet intensely 
human^ and in certain readers provocative of a 
throbbing delight. Not a hint is there as to the 
authorship either of the text or the excellent 
photographs that illustrate it ; nor is there in the 
ordinary way a publisher's name^ the work being 
issued by one of the great emporia, and bearing 
the simple and unassuming title ^^ List of Enter- 
tainments '* ; yet seldom can a book supplied 
with every information concerning writer^ artist^ 
and publisher have excited more pleasurable 
anticipations than this^ or have better deserved 
131 



The Enfranchised Reviewer 

the descriptive title which I have made bold to 
give it. 

The style is both fluent and florid, as good 
Christmas writing should be ; but no words are 
wasted. One demurs a little to the construction 
of the ensuing passage, the full stop at ^'^ young" 
being, I think, mijustifiable, in view of the 
dependence of the sentiment that follows ; but no 
one can deny that it is forcible and informing : — 

Mr. Timber's clever Ventriloquial Entertain- 
ment, in which he introduces his Merry Family 
of Comical Mechanical Figures, sparkles with 
wit and humour, and never fails to please and 
astonish both old and young. The quaint origin- 
ality of the funny sayings, and the rapidity with 
which his voice is changed and adapted to the 
peculiar personality of each figure, stamping him 
as a Ventriloquist of the highest order. 

The picture which illustrates Mr. Timber's merry 
family is excellently grouped, but it revives in 
one's mind once again the question why ventrilo- 
quists do not insist upon figures that approach 
more nearly to life, not only in appearance, but 
in size ? These puppets of Mr. Timber's are mere 
grotesque dolls. Has he never seen Mr. Arthur 
Prince in a conversation with the rude but 
penetrating sailor- boy ? Had he done so, he 
would realise what advantages there are to one 
132 



The Entertainers 

of his calling in adding also to the aural an 
optical illusion of reality. Mr. Timber^ however^ 
can afford to patronise Mr. Prince^ for Mr. Prince^, 
I believe^ is ventriloquist only^ whereas Mr. 
Timber is a wizard too. 

Occasionally our author errs on the side of 
redundancy^ but it is a good fault. Better to 
tell too much than too little. For example^ he 
thus describes the remarkable abilities of Mr. 
Simpson Wreath : — 

His quaintly humorous patter^ which has 
earned for him the title of ^'^The Merry Ma- 
gician/' is as pleasing as his magical experiments 
are mystifying. In his dexterous fingers cards 
and coins appear and disappear at will, while 
bird-cages, flags, live rabbits, pigeons, chickens, 
ducks, and other large objects are materialised in 
bewildering profusion. 

But what else can a magician do — what less ? 
The very word magician, as used in a drawing- 
room, connotes these very powers. There is a 
danger that Mr. Wreath's patter must be con- 
sidered to be his distinguishing mark if these 
ordinary commonplaces of the conjuror's pro- 
fession are thus emphasised. 

A rival wizard, Mr. Ethelred Palmer, whose 
entertainment is so adaptable that it can be 
arranged to occupy from fifteen minutes to two 
^33 



The Enfranchised Reviewer 

hours^ as required^ adds to his regular stock-in- 
trade of marvels an ^^ artistic series of lauo^hable 
hand shadows." No more would be said by a 
frugal writer. But our author^ having a spend- 
thrift nature^ adds that this series ^^ forms an 
extraordinary display of digital dexterity." Good. 
Of another exponent^ Professor Pledger^ it is 
said that his conjuring ^^ leaves nothing to be 
desired " ; but that is too hard a saying. All 
conjuring has left something to be desired^ from 
the days of Pharaoh and Aaron downwards — if 
only the desire to be able to do it one's self. 
However^ let the phrase pass — its intention is 
admirable. 

Conjurors are not the only heroes painted by 
this new^ and anonymous Carlyle. Bands of all 
colom's receive commendations^ illustrated by 
pictures of romantic musical types^ swarthy and 
irresistible ; and there are also exotic concert 
parties^ ^' The Condottieri " from Naples^ and 
^^ The Patches" from the eighteenth century^ 
and ^^The Netsukes " from Japan — each consist- 
ing of three accomplished gentlemen and three 
accomplished ladies^ all musical and humorous. 

Wonderful worlds this world of entertainers 

into which the volume before us gives sucli 

glimpses 1 Its people differ from the people 

of that other and colder w^orld in which we live^ 

134 



Artistes at Home 

in that we see them only at then* best. This vast 
concourse of gifted men and women, who live all 
day their mysterious subterranean life and emerge 
at night into the glittering light of the foot- 
lights (for their world embraces all actors and 
actresses, too,) to amuse us and drive away our 
care, is, indeed, the nearest thing to fairyland 
that we have. Disraeli divided the nations of 
England into the rich and the poor ; but for 
purposes of contrast, the entertained and the 
entertainers would be better. The rich and the 
poor, at any rate, do meet in real life ; but the 
entertainers and the entertained never meet 
except on unreal terms. 

It was once my fortune to break through the 
barrier between the two, and fall, in the full 
light of day, upon the privacy of a little company 
of Mysterious Musicians, who, concealing their 
identity beneath masks and dominos, had for 
some time enchanted the idle loafers of a seaside 
resort, incidentally conveying the impression that 
they were eccentric members of the nobility or 
upper circles. They may, indeed, in new disguises, 
be possibly among the heroes of this book, for 
they were an adaptable folk as ready to be 
Japanese as Neapolitan. I climbed some dark 
stairs over a chemist's, and found the artistes in 
a small front drawing-room with a photograph 
135 



The Enfranchised Reviewer 

frame on every inch of table room. They sat 
around it in easy attitudes^ smoking one and all 
— and it was^ I remember^ the first time I had 
seen a woman smoke. There were five in all, 
and they had the air of the stage but were 
excessively polite and polished. They told me 
(for I will be frank : I was sent by an editor to 
interview them) — they told me false stories of 
selected incidents in their careers, in affected 
voices, and each seemed nervously conscious that 
at any moment a mispronunciation might occur to 
ruin the whole illusion. As a matter of fact, it had 
occurred. The principal lady, who was lost, like 
Elijah's chariot, in a cloud of smoke, was addressed 
and alluded to as " Madam." I was glad to come 
away, for there was a suggestion in the air that 
patchouli had not only been their previous meal 
but would also form the staple dish at their next. 

II. — The Complete Conversationalist 

Having spent an hour in the company of a 
book entitled Picture Paragraphs : Things seen 
in Everyday Life Explained and Illustrated, I am 
now^ one of the best-informed men in England, 
capable of taking my place with distinction at 
any dinner-table and devilish well worth sitting 
by. For I know, if not all, very nearly all. 
136 



A Well-informed Man 

Let me tell you a little of what I know. 1 
know why the horse chestnut is called the horse 
chestnut. Because there are marks resembling 
horseshoes on its branches. I know why a North 
Sea fishing-boat hoists a basket to the mast-head. 
To tell others that the catch was so large that 
only a part of it could be hauled on board. I 
know how to place my fingers and thumb on 
an eel while extracting a hook. I know that 
the original idea of the epaulette was to guard 
the shoulders from sword cuts. I know that the 
distance between the lines on the lid of a sardine 
tin denotes the size of the fish^ and the purchaser 
does wisely who buys them with the lines very 
close together. I know what the little white dot 
in one or other of the letters in the title of a 
daily paper means. It indicates which printing 
machine turned out that copy. 

I know that a triangular post-mark means that 
the missive is a type-written circular. I know 
that the little round hole in jewellers' shutters is 
to allow the policeman to peep through. I know 
that at Bexley and neighbouring villages one can 
still order a yard of beer. I know why Channel 
steamers run up several flags when entering 
harbour. It is to tell the station-master how 
many passengers there are on boards so that he 
may arrange his train accordingly. I know (but 
J37 



The Enfranchised Reviewer 

this for some reason I knew before) the origin 
of the pawnbroker's sign. I know that an ex- 
cellent home-made bath-mat can be constructed 
by thousands of corks in a wooden frame. I 
know how to tell the ranks of naval officers by 
the stripes on their sleeves. 

And finally^ I know why gate-posts of country- 
houses often have stone balls on them ; but this 
piece of information I retail in the words of this 
interesting volume : '^ In ancient times it was 
the custom of the victors in a battle to decorate 
their doorposts with the skulls of the vanquished. 
With the advance of civilisation^ Britons^ of course, 
no longer carry it out, but the custom has not 
been allowed to drop altogether, as is seen by 
the stone balls which are often set on gate-posts 
— a relic of a barbarous idea of long ago. In 
certain parts of Africa the skulls are still used 
as decorations ; whole villages may be seen with 
the door-posts of the houses surmounted in this 
gruesome fashion." 

Every fact in this wonderful book has its accom- 
panying picture — 475 pictures in all. That young 
man in Mr. Anstey's farce. The Man from Blanklet/Sy 
the young man who came to dinner primed with 
the fact that an oyster's heart continues to beat 
for half an hour after it is swallowed, would find 
it a gold-mine. As, indeed, I intend to do. 

138 



Local History 

111. — The Yearly Round 

Having just risen from the perusal of the 
penny almanack put forth by those enterprising 
gentlemen^ Messrs. Heath erback and Day^ of 
the Shakespeare Printing Works^ Plumtown^ 1 
now once more know how like one small English 
town is to another. It is not Plumtown really^ 
but that will serve as a pseudonym. The almanack 
— or Blue Book^ as it is called, from the colour of 
its cover — tells you everything, for it is a directory 
and a local guide, too ; but its great claim to the 
interest of the student of human nature exists in 
its few but pointed pages of local retrospect. 
Here we may see the vicissitudes and triumphs, 
disappointments and tragedies, of Plumtown dur- 
ing the changing year from November 19 — to 
October 19 — . And to read this diary is to 
read the diary of almost every town in the 
country — so little is there to happen in this 
England of ours, this precious stone set in a 
silver sea — outside the earthquake zone, as we 
are, and free from meteorites and tidal waves. 

In default of such major catastrophes, what 
happens ? Why, this : — 

November 1. — The Ven. Archdeacon Wyne, for 
many years the esteemed Vicar of Plumtown, re- 
ceived the honour of being chosen one of the 

139 



The Enfranchised Reviewer 

Committee to advise the Archbishop in regard 
to the King's Letters of Business. 

It is nothing to laugh at. Such an occurrence is 
indeed worthy to open a year's record. And it 
was an honour^ too^ a very real honour. I am 
surprised at such levity. What happened on 
November 8 ? 

The thirteenth annual Chrysanthemum Show_, 
opened by Lady Bagstock^ w^as spoiled financially 
by the weather^ the rain pouring down on the 
first day from morning till night. The show more 
than upheld its high-class reputation. 

A chrysanthemum show is a temptation to 
Providence any way^ and Providence rarely has 
enough fortitude to resist temptation The 
success of the show is^ however^ very gratifying. 

Passing over sudden deaths^ concerts in aid of 
this and that^ hockey matches and elections of 
Guardians_, we come to Christmas Day^ which^ at 
Plumtown^ occurred on December 25. ^^ The 
weather was cold and exhilarating, snow^ frost, 
and ice being prevalent." On the following day. 

Prior to her departure, District Nurse Miss 
Swan met a large company at a social tea and 
entertainment. 

On the last day of the year 

140 



A Benefactor 

At midnight the Abbey bells once more^ with 
muffled tones^ rang out the old year^ and then 
with joyous peals ushered in the dawn of 19 — . 

On January 4 Plumtown defeated a neighbour- 
ing borough at draughts. On the next day a 
rick was burnt downy and on the 8th the highway 
surveyor resigned. On February 6 the eldest son 
of the manager of the PJumtown gasworks married 
Miss Ada Butters. On the 28th, 

The elder scholars of Liss School made the 
remarkable attendance of 99*7 per cent., winning 
the attendance Challenge Shield given by the 
Church Education Society for the Archdeaconry. 

On March 6 the presentations began, the first 
being a silver cigar-case and handsome Worcester 
china to Mr. and Mrs. Peter Leeks. Mr. Peter 
Leeks is a great figure throughout the almanack. 
He distributes prizes, presents testimonials, enter- 
tains the poor, and receives offerings on his own 
behalf. On the same day a young woman fell 
down the cellar steps and broke her neck. On 
the 7th, 

At the Baptist schoolroom, the pastor, the 
Rev. J. Porpoise, gave an interesting lecture on 
" Shams/' 

On the 8th :— 

The employees at the Hercules Works presented 
141 



The Enfranchised Reviewer 

Mr. Christopher Pendennis with an ilkiminated 
address and purse of money as a testimony of their 
high regard for him on his leaving the works. 

And on the 12th:— 

Presentation from Sunday School of a handsome 
travelling clock to Miss Louie M. Buck^ of Little 
Friston^ schoolmistress of the village. 

A series of services for Divine blessing on crops 
was then held, followed by a devastating frosty 
and on April 21 : — 

The Rev. J. Porpoise preached at the Baptist 
Chapel on the Congo horrors^ after which a 
resolution was passed urging the Government to 
take action. 

On the next day : — 

Presentation of an English gold lever watch 
and gold sleeve-links to Mr. A. Swallow, station- 
master at Pufford, on his leaving the village, and 
pearl and gold brooch to Mrs. Swallow, by Mr. 
P. Leeks on behalf of the subscribers. 

I skip a month or so. On June 15 : — 

Mrs. Sinclair, proprietress of a travelling theatre, 
gave a performance in aid of the Cottage Hospital, 
which realised <£2, 10s. 

On June 18 there was 

a performance of ^^ Living Bridge '' by a troupe 
142 



Our Little World 

of ladies and gentlemen^ in aid of the Cottage 
Hospital^ realising <£44. 

On the 22nd :— 

Two cows of Mr. J. B. Dobson*s^ the Poplars, 
Brickleton, and one belonging to Mr. A. R. 
Hobson, were struck dead by lightning. 

On August 17 : — 

Mrs. Elizabeth Hunt, widow, 74 years of age. 
No. 5 Plumtown Terrace, w^as found dead in the 
pantry. ,£114 was found in a cash-box in the 
house. 

Lastly, there is this : — 

October 29. — The parishioners of Ducks 
Broughton presented the Rev. A. W. Wool with 
a reversible office-chair, a drawing-room chair, a 
pipe, and an illuminated address. 

Altogether a busy and very generous year, and 
very like, as I said, the year everywhere else ; but 
it makes excellent reading, I think. To plunge 
one's self so completely into a totally new life 
in a community exactly like one's own, and 
yet utterly distinct from it, is very interesting. 
That is why local papers are such good com- 
panions. 

Meanwhile the inward eye is filled with the 
143 



The Enfranchised Reviewer 

agreeable vision of the Rev. A. W. Wool puffing 
at his old pipe in the old and serviceable arm- 
chair w^hich has been his friend these many years. 
Who ever puts a presentation to practical use ? 
The Rev. A. W. Wool knows better than that. 



H4 



George Mariner ^^ ^> ^> .^ 

TN George Mariner^ by whose grave I have 
just stood^ I lose a good neighbour and 
England the best spechnen of the English 
labouring gentleman that I have known^ and a 
type which cannot^ I suppose^ ever recur — 
at any rate^ not so near London as twenty- 
five miles. Probably^ I fear^ not at all^ for so 
much that makes for unrest has come in since 
his boyhood^ including even such phenomena as 
railways^ to say nothing of the motor-car^ and the 
halfpenny paper^ and better education^ and — 
among labouring people — ambition. I put am- 
bition last^ but I suppose that its true place is 
first. At any rate_, the want of ambition — more^ 
the quiet and natural acceptance of the fact that 
he had no right to such a luxury — w^as the great 
difference between George Mariner and the 
labourer with present-day notions. If he was of 
a cheerful cast^ it was largely because, having 
K 145 



George Mariner 

inherited or acquired a disposition to expect 
nothings he was never disappointed. Not that 
he cringed or was abjectly meek ; not at all. He 
had independent and level eyes ; but he knew 
himself to be a tiller of the soil, worth (even in 
his best days^ with a large family) no more than 
sixteen shillings a week^ and he accepted his 
destiny. 

If I had to give his leading characteristic in a 
word^ I think I should say acceptance. He was 
very near the earth : he accepted^ as the earth 
does, uncomplainingly^ naturally — whether it was 
rain or sun. All his life, whatever had come to 
him had seemed to be more than his due. Think 
of it! 

He lived, as I have said, to be eighty-five, and 
for the whole of this long life his home was on 
one farm within twenty-five miles of London, 
occasionally moving from one cottage to another 
— he was in one (with only four rooms) for up- 
wards of fifty years — but never leaving this farm, 
although farmer after farmer left or died, and 
never travelling farther than Rochester (once) 
and London (twice), to carry some hops thither 
at a time when he was allowed to grow a few in 
his own garden — a time far away in the past. 

He worked in this garden almost to the end, 
and had good health ; but he was feeble, and his 
146 



Philosophic Tolerance 

one eye (the other had been knocked out in a 
copse by a released bough half a century ago, 
before the Workmen's Compensation Act) pained 
him. For the past five or six years he had lived 
a gentleman's hfe, partly on parish relief and 
partly on an allowance made by a neighbour. 
He would sit at the door and w^atch the weather, 
which he could foretell with almost undeviating 
accuracy, and exchange a w^ord with any one who 
passed. His only jaunt was on Saturdays, when 
he went to the nearest town, two miles away, 
to collect his weekly dole, be shaved, and drink 
two pennyworth of beer. Beer, even this small 
quantity, endowed him with an extra touch of 
benignancy, whereas its effect on his very French - 
looking son was to emphasise his natural politeness 
into a polished courtesy that was more embarrass- 
ing to the recipient than any rudeness could be. 

1 would not call him a cynic, but he w^as 
certainly an old philosopher. There is perhaps 
no great difference. I used on my almost daily 
call (for we occupied neighbouring cottages) to 
read him odd and progressive things from the 
papers, all of which he received with a gentle 
amused tolerance. They were not for him, these 
novelties, and probably were not going to do 
any one any good ; but why should they not be } 
Why should not the rich — that strange, foreign 
147 



George Mariner 

• 
l)eople — be amused ? A cynic ? No^ he certainly 

was not that, although there was in his very 
winning smile a hint of — what shall I say? — 
superiority. Not exactly, except the superiority 
that an old, tired rustic possesses over foolish 
3^oung plutocrats who have lost their heads over 
a new toy. 1 think the w^ord is tolerance — 
amused tolerance, possibly irony. But a cynic ? 
No. His mind was too sweet. He remained 
sweet bravely, indomitably, in spite of much 
having happened to embitter him beyond nearly 
a century of poverty : unsatisfactory children to 
begin with, and then — what must be almost as 
saddening — unsatisfactory grandchildren ; but he 
remained sweet, although unexpecting. 

His wife was not, I will admit, so humble. 
She had opinions ; but he, never. She was a 
clever, inquisitive woman, a year older than he. 
I have spent hours in her compan}^ during the 
past ten years, and never without profit or enter- 
tainment. She claimed some French blood, and 
certainly there was the shrewdness of the old 
French peasant woman in her outlook : she had 
esprit. Even more French was that bibulous son, 
whose features and colouring was absolutely those 
of a small Normandy ybrw/er. All he needed was 
the blue linen to perfect the illusion. This son 
was a curious, gentle creature, who could not get 
148 



Lady Mariner 

on with his wife because of her persistence in 
the heresy that the world is round. Driven thus 
from home by an incurable incom})atibility of 
physical geography^ he roamed much alone and 
gathered strange salads from the hedges. (Here 
we may perhaps see atavism freakishly at work^ 
for what English labourer ever cared for salad ?) 
And too often he wandered into the ^^ King's 
Head " with surer feet than those that left it. 
The old lady — Lady Mariner, as the villagers 
always called her, with a touch of satire, no doubt, 
but also in acknowledgment of a hint of aristoc- 
racy, or at any rate difference from themselves, 
about her — the old lady not only had French 
blood but an English ancestry that made her the 
cousin of William Lambert the cricketer — who 
used to play for Surrey and England, and in all 
the great matches ; who ^^ held his bat over his 
shoulder before hitting " ; and of whom it was 
said, by one of the early critics, that ^* the 
bowler^ instead of attacking him, seemed always 
to be at his mercy.'' Lambert's greatest feat 
was perhaps his single- wicket match in 1810 with 
Lord Frederick Beauclerk and T. C. Howard for 
<£100. Lambert's partner w^as to have been Mr. 
Osbaldestone ; but on the morning Mr. Osbalde- 
stone was too ill to play, and Lambert went 
through the match alone, and won it by fifteen 
149 



George Mariner 

runs. " He used to stand with his left foot out 
a very long way/' said Lord Bessborough^ "and 
then draw it up rapidly on playing. He thought 
it put the bowler off his pitch." I liked to think 
that in talking to Lady Mariner I was talking to 
the cousin of this great man. 

She told me a story of Lambert coming in in a 
fury one evening on his way back to his fuller's 
earth pits at Nutfield after a match. He was a 
good age then_, but had been playing somewhere 
in Kent and was walking home as though it were 
nothing. He just looked in like thunder and 
was oif again. "Not staying to supper?" his 
cousin asked. "Supper! I don't want any 
supper/' he growled ; " I've been cheated out I " 
And off he strode^ the great cricketer^ Mr. 
Osbaldestone's viceroy^ with the umpire's decision 
still rankling. 

Old George Mariner had a very agreeable^ 
quiet humour^ and^ what is very necessary to the 
quiet humorist and is rather common in the 
humble^ a good memory. Our jokes used to go 
on from day to day^ from week to week. We 
would sometimes throw back allusively to a con- 
versation of a month ago ; he never failed to 
make the journey or take the point, whereas his 
wife, for all her superior quickness, was often at 
fault. Her memory, though vivid concerning all 



A Stylist 

that had happened to neighbours^ wealthy or 
poor^ and extending to the remote past^ was not 
as good as his ; it did not take the same account 
of conversations. She talked,, but he listened ; 
that was the difference. When he did talk^ his 
remarks were always pointed and perfectly 
phrased. His choice of words was my continual 
admiration. It was not scriptural at all (I could 
never find that he had any strong religious views^ 
and certainly neither he nor his wife ever went 
to churchy or^ to my knowledge^ read anything 
but the papers)^ but of the soil. His mind was 
clear^ and what he saw he made you see. 

The sadness at his funeral came more from the 
living than the dead. I said just now something 
about the new labourer having ambition ; but it 
is not true of George Mariner's sons. He left 
them his own humility^ but it is not fortified by 
his own sense of duty. Looking at them by the 
grave^ each with his poor tired wife on his arm 
(it is only at funerals that they take their 
husband's arms)^ I was conscious that life had 
little for them now but rheumatism and poverty ; 
and I believe they were conscious of it too. The 
younger — the French one — I met on the follow- 
ing afternoon^ and his manners were more than 
perfect. So it will go on ! 



151 



The Knocking at the Door^ o <:> 

T HEARD it^ this knocking at the door^ for 
-*- the first time the other evening, in tones so 
unmistakable that I have thought of little else 
since. We were a party of four not too anti- 
quated contemporaries, and during dinner we 
made our little jokes as we had always done, 
and found in each other the same old quick- 
enough intelligence. And then who should come 
in but the son and daughter of the house — the 
children, as one had been calling them and 
thinking of them for eighteen years or so ; 
but now, suddenly, children no more, but a 
young man and a young woman with keen critical 
eyes, and a composed cynical view of life, and a 
mocking sense of humour as different from our 
own as wine from milk. ^^ That's funny," said 
the boy sarcastically now and then ; but the 
girl merely opened wide her cool grey eyes 
beneath lifted brows — ^^ I am not surprised," 
152 



A Shelf of Vantage 

she seemed to say: ^^wliat can one expect of 
parents* friends ? " And so^ gradually^ our inno- 
cent facetiousness died away, and we became 
grave and self-conscious, sought our themes and 
our epithets with care, shivered a little, and then 
suddenly I knew I had become old ; my hands 
withered, my hair whitened, my back bent, my 
knees creaked. It was all over. This was age ; 
but the sting of it was that these interlopers, 
these Germans in an Englishman's home, made 
one feel that it was not venerable age. It was 
just fogeydom, senility. The younger generation 
was here ; it had its hands urgently on a wrought- 
iron knocker of terrific calibre. 

No joke, I tell you, when first you meet this 
dangerous new force. 

I am a little more resigned now — that was a 
week ago — I am growing accustomed to my 
shelf; now and then I rather like its loftiness, 
and could describe it with some of the fervour 
and eloquence of a house-agent : old-world 
peace, perfect sanitation, unparalleled view, and 
all the rest of it ! This I am sure is the thing 
that one ought to do as soon as one's nerves 
are a little rested after that terrible knocking . 
one ought to become as reconciled as one can 
to one's new lot. There was a character in one 
of Mr. Jones' plays, who confessed to being 
153 



The Knocking at the Door 

an ass but utterly repudiated the suggestion 
that he was a silly ass. So with the fogeys. We 
will admit that we are fogeys^ but don't let us 
be silly fogeys. Let us still keep our eyes open ; 
let us indeed return stare for stare with these 
young besiegers. 

So I write^ and then I pause and ask myself^ 
But where is the younger generation after all ? 
I met it that evenings it is true ; but where is 
it in the world of art and thought ? Where is 
it ? I take down Who's Who from the shelf 
and turn to a few of the names that stand for 
what is most original or stimulating or con- 
structive in our intellectual life. Searching 
among the M.'s I come upon that great and 
understanding laugher whose washen eyes until 
a month or so ago examined the world from his 
hermitage at the foot of Box Hill. Did the 
younger generation ever lift the knocker of that 
stronghold of irony and tears ? Never. But its 
owner was only eighty-two. I know that on the 
two occasions during the past three years in which 
I was privileged to sit with him and listen to his 
vivid conversation — half reminiscence^ and half 
criticism of life — it was I who seemed to be the 
aged one. Surrounded by cigar-boxes and Euro- 
pean reviews he talked of everything — of prize 
fighters and cricket^ of conscription and new 
154 



G. M. 

novels^ of the country and What Every Woman 
Knows, of the English character and the German. 
He said he beHeved that when the French had 
overcome their excitement — their hysteria in the 
field — they would be the best players of Rugby 
football in the world. He described a visit to 
Holland and called the canals of Rotterdam ^^ the 
very plebs of the Venetian idea " — giving the 
syllables of ^^idea" all their value. 

I told him that he was looking very well. 
^^ The devil I am ! " said he. And he went on to 
lament his inactivity under such mental vigour^ 
and described how he sent his soul forth to the 
visible — all about the fields and woods and river- 
banks of the country-side_, once so accessible and 
familiar^ where his little donkey-carriage could 
not now take him — walking in the spirit as once 
he had walked so actually. 

He was humorously angry with people who 
thought him old. He had just received a letter 
from a French admirer beginning Venerable 
Maitre. ^^ Venerable Maitre ! '' he repeated in 
laughing scorn ; ^^ why^ I am as young as any of 
them. I may be chained by the leg here^ but 
I am with them in their artistic energies, in 
their political aspirations — and in their amorous 
kneelings." 

I turn to the S.'s and find that our English 
155 



The Knocking at the Door 

Ibsen — or shall I say our Irish Nietzsche ? — is a 
middle-Victorian by birth, for the year 1856 gave 
him to a waiting world. That makes him fifty- 
three, this year of I must not say his Lord ; yet 
his knocker need not be muffled for many years 
to come. 

And the poets ! Poetry used to be a young 
man's fancy ; but the poets who are read to-day 
are old or middle-aged. The last inspired 
undergraduate was Mr. Swinburne, and that was 
in the late fifties ; what have they been doing 
since ? The last inspired schoolboy was Mr. 
Kipling, and it is now a grizzled head that 
one meets in the valleys of the iron country 
beside the hammer ponds. Young, yes, he is 
still young ; but at half his present age he bad 
struck some fire from the earth, and what 
schoolboy is doing that now? 

I look (horrid sight) at Parliament, and there 
again the work is being done by the later 
middle-aged and the elderly. Young men enter 
the lists, but they drop no such fusees into the 
river from the terrace as need send Father 
Thames to an Insurance company. For the 
most part the young parliamentarian apes the 
caution of senility. The two youngest members 
of the Cabinet wear collars (I observe) that the 
Grand Old Man might have bequeathed to them. 

156 



Test Veterans 

Even in the cricket field the older men are 
still doing the brunt of the work, and no Test 
Committee dare leave them out. But cricket 
is going out of fashion. The young men prefer 
to walk round a golf links — the quickest road 
to crabbed age. 

No^ just at the moment youth is disconcertingly 
quiescent except in the family. But there I 
Good Heavens^ it is powerful enough there ! 
The knocker is never still. 



157 



The Poefs Chairs ^o o o ^> 

"P VERY newspaper reader — by which I mean 
^^^ every one who reads many different news- 
papers^ as I^ for my sins and breads must do — is 
bound to fall often under what might be called 
the tyranny of the exchange. He is continuously 
finding in one paper some paragraph or article 
which he had already read in another and hoped 
to have forgotten. Sometimes^ especially if he 
travels about England at all and buys county or 
local papers (in many ways the best papers of all^ 
because nearer normal life)^ he may come upon 
this same and tiresome thing three or four times 
in a day. 

Such an experience has just been mine. I 
remember reading several weeks ago a half 
column of random and rather curious information 
about famous authors, entitled '^ Foibles of 
Literary Men.'' It began with a sudden state- 
ment in a single line — 

Keats liked red pepper on his toast — 

158 



New Book, New Picture 

and passed on to equally unexpected allegations^ 
each a little longer than the last, until at the end 
of the half column we reached a statement three 
lines in extent, such as — 

Oliver Wendell Holmes used to carry a horse- 
chestnut in one pocket and a potato in another to 
ward off rheumatism. 

I remember I read this in the casual way in 
which one takes in a journalistic ^^ fill " ; wondered 
a little at its origin, and as to how long it had 
been going the rounds ; guessed it to be American 
and already of considerable age^ but destined to 
something like immortality ; and preserved in 
my mind one only of its gems — 

Alexandre Dumas, the younger, bought a new 
painting every time he had a book published. 

I remembered this because it was constructive, 
and recorded a habit (certainly not a foible) that 
I have myself been trying to contract. It was 
interesting to find that one had had this fastidious 
predecessor. 

Since then I have twice come upon the same 
procession of eccentrics, led as ever by Keats 
with his red pepper; and now this morning I 
receive by gift a Scottish religious paper, and here 
they are again, Keats with his smouldering palate 
still at the head. What can I do but (like the 
159 



The Poet's Chairs 

owner of Mr. Jacobs' terrible Monkey's Paw) 
pass it on to others and myself be free ? Here it 
is^ in what a really educated writer would call 
extenso : — 

Foibles of Literary Men 

Keats liked red pepper on toast. 

Dickens was fond of wearing jewellery. 

Daudet wore his eyeglasses when asleep. 

Joaquin Miller nailed all his chairs to the wall. 

Edgar Allan Poe slept with his cat^ and was 
inordinately proud of his feet. 

Thackeray used to lift his hat whenever he 
passed the house in which he wrote Vanity 
Fah\ 

Alexandre Dumas^ the younger^ bought a new 
painting every time he had a new book 
published. 

Robert Louis Stevenson's favourite recreation 
was playing the flute^ in order^ as he said^ to tune 
up his ideas. 

Robert Browning could not sit still. With the 
constant shuffling of his feet holes were worn in 
the carpet. 

Longfellow enjoyed walking only at sunrise or 
sunset^ and he said his sublimest moods came 
upon him at these times. 

Hawthorne always washed his hands before 
reading a letter from his wife. He delighted in 
poring over old advertisements in the newspaper 
files. 

Darwin had no respect for books as books, and 
i6o 



Foibles 

would cut a big volume in two^ for convenience in 
handlings or he would tear out the leaves he 
required for reference. 

Oliver Wendell Holmes used to carry a horse- 
chestnut in one pocket and a potato in another to 
ward off rheumatism. 

It is like a popular history of English and 
American literature. As I write I find myself 
longing to continue it. Surely there are foibles 
among the living worth recording. 

Mr. Andrew Lang 

But no^ one must not. 

Mr. Maurice Hewlett— — 
Stay ! And yet I know one of Mr. Hewlett's 
foibles so very well^ and I am sure it would 
interest thousands of people who have never read 
his books. But the time is not yet. 

It seems hard that a literary man's foibles have 
to be so blazoned forth : especially since if some 
literary men had no foibles they would have 
nothing at all. By their foibles they live. If I 
could think that the original compiler of this list 
w^ere sympathetic I should not mind ; but one 
suspects disapproval^ one has a sense of reproof. 
The word ^^ foible " is a criticism. One feels 
the cataloguer will never, for example^ forgive 
Browning for his treatment of the carpet : we 
can get along fairly well without cryptic mono- 
L i6i 



The Poet's Chairs 

logues^ but Axminster is Axminster. Keats^ too, 
clearly ought to have been satisfied with the 
ordinary British condiments : so much the less 
poet he, if he could not, and we will give the 
^^ Ode to Autumn " a rest. It is obvious also that 
to a sleeping man eyeglasses are of little service : 
let us therefore read not Tariarin nor the Lettres 
de Mon Moulin, but Le Maitre de Forges and Sans 
Famille, neither Hector Malot nor Georges Ohnet 
having ever done anything wayward or amusing. 
I cannot help feeling that this is the kind of 
criticism to which the reader is expected to come, 
not only by the original anthologist but by the 
Scottish editor too. Search as you will in the 
inner personal history of Ian Maclaren or Robert- 
son Nicoll (I seem to hear him say), you will find 
no red pepper ; you will find no foot shuffling, no 
tearing up books, no tricks with furniture. 

This brings us to the most perplexing case of 
all : Joaquin Miller. Two things about his foible 
bother me ; one is that it is called a foible, and 
the other that the act is put in the past tense. 
It is said that he ^^ nailed his chairs to the wall " : 
as we should say of one of Nelson's admirals, that 
he nailed his colours to the mast. It is as though 
the Poet of the Sierras, who is, of course, still 
living, either was dead or had long given up the 
quaint practice. If the statement ran, ^^ Joaquin 
162 



Joaquin Miller 

Miller nails all his chairs to the wall " — that is, 
always does it, never acquires a new chair without 
calling for the tool chest, never sees a chair any- 
where without feeling for his bowie-hammer — 
then I should agree that it is something of a 
foible, although in reality passing into the regions 
of the greater eccentricity. A foible is a purely 
personal idiosyncrasy, such as sleeping with a 
cat, or washing one's hands before reading a 
letter from one's wife. Reduced to its naked 
meaning it is, I take it, a weakness — 'djaiblesse — 
but a weakness affecting only one's self. A man, 
however, who nails his chairs to the wall without 
giving due notice of the proceeding (the italics are 
absolutely mine) may be said to affect others. I 
can think of nothing more disconcerting than at 
dinner-time to attempt to draw a chair to Mr. 
Miller's otherwise hospitable board. This is not 
a foible : this is practical joking ; and very good 
practical joking too, I think, — once. 

My theory is that it occurred as a matter of 
fact only once, and that is why the past tense is 
employed : — 

Joaquin Miller nailed all his chairs to the wall. 

Then came the reckoning and he did it no more. 
I have ahvays read of him as being of late years 
somewhat crippled. 

163 



The Perfect Widow ^ <^ ^ ^ 

A /T R. GOSSE_, I remember^ once directed some 
of his adroit and entertaining eloquence 
against the practice of permitting widows to 
become the biographers of their late husbands ; 
his objection being the heightened and inhuman 
level of merit consequently reached by the subject 
,of the memoir^ to the detriment of good bio- 
graphy and the confusion of friends who believed 
themselves to have know^n those husbands in the 
flesh. Rather^ Mr. Gosse seemed to say — I have 
-difficulty in giving his words accurately^ for he 
wrote in a periodical (now in Heaven) that cost 
a guinea — rather than that widows should continue 
to practise biography on these lines^ he would 
vote for the immediate acclimatisation of suttee. 

Before going to this extreme we must read 
the Life of Dame Parti et^ which is the biography 
not by^ but of^ a widow^ and which in the excess 
of rectitude and all the virtues that it grants to 
the good lady goes far to adjust the balance. Dame 
Partlet is the Perfect Widow : perfect^ that is, for 
164 



Dame Partlet 

old-fashioned folk who do not want widows to be 
meny^ after the modern frivolous tendency. A 
merry widow was once either a contradiction in 
terms or a signal error of taste ; but to-day. . . . 

This, however_, is a regrettable digression. 
Speaking as a fossil who knows nothing of the 
melodies of Herr Lehar beyond what is forced 
upon the reluctant ears at every street corner, 
I would boldly call Dame Partlet the perfect 
widow. Not a blemish is on her character. 
And a widow resigned, too, a widow to the 
end, as those inspired authorities. Sir Willoughby 
Patterne and Mrs. Berry, otherwise unlike 
enough, would have her be. She made no 
mistake. She lived to be sixty-nine, and died 
with tidy symmetry, catching on her birthday the 
chill that carried her off — it w^as June 10 — and 
when she died her every neighbour mourned. 
This, in England, in a village, is a great triumph. 

Nor to the best of my beHef has the Devil's 
Advocate yet arisen, although the Dame flourished 
more than a hundred and fifty years ago. Of how 
many widows can this be said ? 

Dame Partlet' s Life was written for children, 
and, I believe, read by them for generations. It 
may easily be held that without the example 
of this Perfect Widow England would be different 
to-day. To every child in her village who never 

165 



The Perfect Widow 

told a lie^ the Dame had the pleasant habit of 
giving a slice of cake and a glass of wine (cowslip, 
elder, or currant), a cheesecake, and a pie. An 
illustration depicts her making her annual dis- 
tribution : to ten children in all, boys and girls 
equally divided, five of each. How these ten 
children must have radiated influence ! A slice 
of cake, a glass of wine, a cheesecake, and a 
pie^ are worth telling the truth for. It may be 
that it is to this custom of the Dame's that we 
owe our exemplary Police and Press. 

The title-page of the book, in my edition, runs 
thus : — 

DAME PARTLETS FARM 

Containing 

an account 

of the 

Great Riches she obtained by Industry, 

The Good Life She Led, 

and, alas ! Good Reader ! 

HER SUDDEN DEATH ; 

to which is added 

A HYMN 

written by Dame Partlet 

just before her Death, 

and an 

EPITAPH 

for her Tomb-stone. 

i66 



Squire Takeall 

The Dame's biographer was certainly a master. 
That no 'prentice hand was involved is again 
and again apparent. Look at this^ for example^ 
quite early in the book : — 

Indeed Dame Partlet often observed,, that 
one good turn deserves another ; and ^^ How happy 
and comfortable/' says she^ ^^ might a whole 
village live^ even if they w^ere all poor^ if every- 
body w^ould try to shew each other all the 
kindness in their power." But Dame Partlet 
never said anything of that kind without en- 
deavouring to shew it by her practice : and 
though Squire Takeall^ the Lord of the Manor^ 
was a very rich man^ and had a very great house 
in the middle of a large park^ and had a whole 
room full of books which he never read^ and 
wore a great many fine cloaths^ and kept a 
great many servants with brown liveries turned 
up with red velvet ; and though he kept a 
great many horses and dogs^ and rode over 
poor people's fields^ and trampled down their 
corn ; and though his grey-hounds had all the 
nice victuals that came from his own table^ and 
his hogs were fed upon the skim milk such as 
Farmer Wheatear gave Dame Partlet for her 
children ; yet for all he was so rich and so fine^ 
and everybody in the village pulled off their 
hat or made a curtsey when he passed, yet Squire 
Takeall did not do so much real good in the 
village as Dame Partlet, with only a garden and 
orchard, and a few books on a shelf just over 
the salt-box. 

167 



The Perfect Widow 

That touch about the salt-box is no accident ; 
but throughout there are evidences of a very 
practised hand at work : the writer knew his 
business. 

Again ^ there are signs of the capable artificer 
in the description of the village — ^^ situated a very 
long way from London_, in the direct road to the 
South^ upon a very pleasant large green^ or small 
common^ with a fine pond of water in the middle 
of it, and Dame Partlet's cottage was in the 
pleasantest- part of the village — viz., at the 
back of the pond, with a full view of the church 
and a fine prospect of the distant country beyond 
it. The rectory was a very handsome house, on 
the right side of the churchyard, so that she had 
only a side view of the front, and nobody would 
look through the windows to see what was doing 
within." A hint of Defoe's method is in this 
particularisation. No ordinary writer would have 
italicised the word '^ right," or have gone to such 
pains to explain the situation. 

The village obviously was in Sussex : ^^ a very 
long way from London in the direct road to the 
South " could be nowhere else. Mr. Walkley 
lately gave it as his belief that the Mistakes of a 
Night occurred in a house on the forest ridge of 
that delectable county : Dame Partlet's village^ 
with her good view over the weald, might have 
i68 



The Hand of Oliver 

been not far beneath it^ say somewhere in the 
neighbourhood of Hay wards Heath. 

I make this allusion to She Stoops to Conquer 
because it amuses me to think that Goldsmith, 
who did all kinds of work for Newbery, wrote 
Dame Partlet too. It even includes a reference 
to Margery^ or Goody Two-Shoes, who is said to 
have instructed the infant Partlet : Margery being 
one of the brightest figures in the Newberyan or 
Corner-of-St.-Paul's-Churchyard mythology. Her 
history has of course often been attributed to 
Goldsmith, but there are surely as many signs of 
his pen in that of Dame Partlet. 

The description of the village ends on the 
following naive note, introducing a copy of verses 
with a picture (which, like all the others in the 
book, obviously comes from Newbery's reserve 
store of woodblocks) : ^^ It is said to have been in 
this village that the following beautiful little poem 
was written ; but whether by Mr. Lovetruth, Mr. 
Singclear, or Dame Partlet, w^as not known." 
" Was not known " is good. The poem begins : — 

Now the nymphs and swains advance 
O'er the lawn in festive dance. 

In Newbery's History of Little Goody Tivo-Shoes, 
1765, the same artless device is found for intro- 
ducing both pictures and verses. Thus : ^^ On 
169 



The Perfect Widow 

this occasion the following hymn^ or rather a 
translation of the twenty-third Psalm^ is said to 
have been written^ and was soon after published 
in the Spectator,'* The History oj Little Goody Two- 
Shoes and Dame Partlefs Farm are alike in the 
unobtrusive obtrusiveness with which they ad- 
vertise St. Paul's Churchyard wares. For example, 
Goody Two -Shoes' father is said to have died 
miserably because he was seized with a violent 
fever in a place where Dr. James's powders could 
not be had — the sale of Dr. James's powders for 
fevers, small-pox, measles, colds, etc., being one 
of Newbery's (and later Harris's) patents. And in 
Dame Partlet's Farm we find this : — 

To those who attended the most constant, and 
behaved best at church, as well as to those who 
soonest learnt those little books, the Rector, at 
his own expense, gave a larger book every New 
Year's day, which he got from the Corner of 
St. Paul's Church Yard : So that besides 2' he 
History of Young Edwin and Little Jessy and the 
Tales of the Cottage, Polly Partlet had a beautiful 
Common Prayer Book in a blue cover with gold 
edges (for which she made herself a green baize 
case) that Mr. Lovetruth had given her the last 
New Year's day, because she had said her 
catechism so well, and behaved so properly at 
church. And that good man. Bishop Puresoul, 
had observed, that of all the children who came 
to him at the Cathedral for Confirmation from the 
170 



'Twixt Bunyan and Thackeray 

neighbouring villages^ none were so well prepared 
as those which Mr. Lovetruth brought from the 
village of Innocence. 

This tricky of course^ spread. Even Charles 
and Mary Lamb consented to play with it in 
Mrs, Leicester s School, where, in Emily Barton's 
story, the coachman is ordered to drive to 
Skinner Street, Mrs. Godwin s publishing house, 
for some books. Lamb, however, who possibly 
held the pen here, although it is one of his 
sister's stories, scores a point beyond Newbery by 
making Emily's father debate on the respective 
merits of the wares at the Corner of St. Paul's 
Churchyard and at Skinner Street, and then 
decide deliberately upon the latter. That is 
very ingenious and must have given him much 
pleasure. 

The nomenclature of the Dame Partlet book 
comes midway between that of John Bunyan and 
Thackeray. The village of Innocence, where the 
Dame lived and eventually ruled, in the County 
of True Delight (it must be Sussex !), would not 
have been so called had not the spiritual adventures 
of Christian come before. (The County of True 
Delight, however true as a description, is, none 
the less, an error in literary tact, for our counties 
are few and known, and the narrator thus loses 
a point in realism. It was not worthy of the 
171 



The Perfect Widow 

author who wrote the passage about the books 
over the salt-box^ on an earher page.) The name 
of the parson^ Mr. Lovetruth^ smacks also of 
The Pilgrim s Promxss, But Farmer Wheatear 
and Giles Joltem the waggoner^ and Cousin 
Coverup the sexton^ and neighbour Trollop the 
feckless villager^ and Mr. Spellright the school- 
master^ have affinity to Lord Southdown and the 
Countess of Bareacres. The fitness of these old 
names must have simplified life immensely. The 
question ^^ What to do with our boys } " can have 
had no terrors for the fathers of the infants Joltem^ 
Coverup^ and Puresoul. 

Dame Partlet's husband was Simon Partlet^ a 
gardener^ whose reading in his profession was, 
it need hardly be said, confined to books published 
or supplied by Newbery, and after him Harris. 
He died of a decline when only thirty. His 
wife not only had been taught by Goody 
Two-Shoes, but was a near relative. Her 
maiden name is not given. She had read her 
Bible three times through, knew many psalms 
by heart, and possessed also Thomas a Kempis, 
The Whole Duty of Man, The Christian s Daily 
Walk with God, and The Economy of Human 
Life, Newbery and Harris, one feels sure, had 
editions of all these. From the last-named book, 
which is still very common in Fourpenny Boxes, and 
172 



Mr, Singclear 

has lately been reprinted once more^ Mr. Coverup, 
the sexton^ a distant cousin of Mr. Partlet's^ copied 
moral sentences^ which were pasted on a card 
and ^^ hung up in the kitchen by the side of the 
clock^ for the Dame's monishment/' 

It was some time after her husband's death 
ere Dame Partlet drew attention from what are 
known as the right people. She had friends^ it 
is true, but not the influential ones. Cousin 
Coverup, the sexton, who had a kind of passion 
for spade-work, ^^ came every Saturday after- 
noon, when he had no graves to make against 
Sunday, and dug such part of the garden as 
required it ; and Mr. Singclear, the parish clerk, 
who superintended the Rector's garden, and who 
had read the Gardener s folio Dictionary, and 
Riders Almanac'' (doubtless in the right edition), 
'^ trained the vines and pruned the trees ; in 
return for which kindness, Dame Partlet always 
joined Mr. Singclear in reading and singing the 
psalms on Sunday, and said Amen the loudest of 
anybody in the church, except Miss Deborah 
Crabface, the Rector's maiden aunt by the 
mother's side." But what is the help of a sexton 
and a parish clerk in the great battle of life } We 
must seek our allies from higher ranks — from 
the Crabfaces, for example, and the Lo vet ruths. 

Deborah Crabface, according to the author's 
173 



The Perfect Widow 

system of naming his characters, would seem 
likely to possess a sour and grudging nature. 
Not so : — 

The Rector had no black cherries in his orchard, 
and Dame Partlet happened to mention one day 
at his house that cherry-brandy was very good for 
the cholic, and as Miss Deborah Crabface was not 
only often seized with the cholic herself, but also 
wished to assist those poor women of the village 
who were afflicted with the same complaint, she 
had expressed a wish to have the black cherries. 
Miss Deborah sometimes gave the child a silver 
sixpence who carried them ; and one season, 
when the tree produced more than usual, she 
sent Dame Partlet a beautiful gown, which had 
been the Rector's grandmother's, and from which 
she made no doubt but the notable Dame 
could make a frock for one of the children to 
wear on Sundays. 

At last, however (I have been anticipating a 
little in the matter of the cherries), at last came 
Dame Partlet' s true recognition. The Rector, 
Mr. Lovetruth (how could he have been other- 
wise named }), held an epoch-making conver- 
sation with the Dame by the roadside. The 
incident is thus recorded : — 

" Sir,'' says she to Mr. Lovetruth, who called 
her Good Woman, and asked her how she kept 
herself and her children so clean upon so small 

174 



A Pearl Among Women 

a pittance^ ^^my children gather up the dead 
branches which are continually dropping from 
some of those large trees^ and they serve to 
kindle my fire in the winter_, and to boil my 
tea-kettle both morning and afternoon in the 
summer^ without the expense of keeping a fire 
all day ; and the leaves which are blown off in 
the autumn they gather into a heap on that 
waste part of the green^ where by being frequently 
wet they become dung^ and make excellent 
manure for my garden^ which I could not other- 
wise procure. The geese^ the ducks_, and the 
fowls range upon this common^ and only require 
a little barley (which my children glean in the 
time of harvest) to be given them every morning 
and evenings by way of making them know their 
home^ and preventing them laying their eggs 
abroad. Giles Joltem^ the waggoner_, buys my 
eggs of me every fortnight^ as he passes by 
with the stage waggon to London ; and when 
I have any poultry to sell^ Biddy Brighteye, 
Farmer Wheatear's dairy-maid_, is so kind as to 
take them to market for me. By these means, 
and the kindness of the farmers in the village, 
I have hitherto been able to bring up my children 
decently; but I also get something by my honey, 
for bees (continued the Dame) are so very pro- 
fitable to the owners^ that I wonder all the poor 
people in the village do not keep them ; by their 
industry they obtain that which is provision for 
themselves^ and an useful article to mankind, 
without injury to any one, as the sweets which 
they sip from the flowers^ and the honey dews 

175 



The Perfect Widow 

which they collect from those lime-trees^ would^ 
without their care and labour^ be entirely lost/' 

Thenceforward the Dame forged ahead^ aided 
by the last will and testament of her cousin 
Coverup^ the sexton, who had been in the habit 
of putting one of her apple pasties in his pocket, 
" to eat when he was making a grave in the cold 
churchyard." Cousin Coverup's legacy was all 
his goods, a bull and fifteen cows. Also the 
Dame inherited <£7l from her uncle and (the 
biographer is minute) £3, 12s. from her sister. 
Then came the fortunate incident of Farmer 
Tipple's death by drowning in his .own horse- 
pond. What Farmer Tipple was doing at all in 
the village of Innocence is not explained ; 
possibly he was permitted to sojourn there merely 
to serve as a humble instrument for the Dame's 
advancement. Anyway, ^^ in going home from 
the public-house one dark night, he slipped into 
his own horse-pond and was drowned." The 
passage that follows is quite perfect, both technic- 
ally and in its commentary on human nature 
in villages : — 

As soon as Farmer Pleasant heard of this 
accident, he sent Mr. Lovegold, the Squire's 
steward, a present of a nice sucking-pig, and 
requested that he would let him have Tipple's 
farm, because it w^as so much larger than his own 
176 



Human Nature 

on the green. Peter Partlet told this to his 
sister Polly as a great secret ; and Polly happen- 
ing by chance to mention it in the kitchen in the 
rectory/ just as Miss Deborah Crabface stepped 
into the private pantry^ to fetch a bottle of 
currant wine^ after supper on the Sunday evenings 
Miss Deborah overheard it^ and spoke of it in the 
parlour to Mr. Lovetruth^ very kindly adding, 
that she thought now was the time when the 
good Dame should be rewarded for the services 
she had done in the village, and be assisted to 
take Pleasant' s farm, which was situated just by 
her own cottage. 

Miss Deborah enforced her good intentions by 
observing, that it was entirely owing to Dame 
Partlet that not a child in the parish now would 
put its hand through the rails and pluck any of 
the Rector's roses ; because she had taught them 
it was naughty to do so. 

The next morning, at Mr. Lovetruth's request, 
his aunt Deborah paid a visit to Mrs. Lovegold ; 
for Mrs. Lovegold sometimes looked in the great 
folio prayer book with Miss Deborah at church ; 
and Mrs. Lovegold stated the matter favourably 
to her husband, the farm was obtained for Dame 
Partlet, and Mr. Lovetruth assisted her to 
purchase those articles which Farmer Pleasant 
wished to leave on the premises. 

The thread of the story (a hint to biographers) 
is here broken very agreeably by a versified 
account, in the metre of Goldsmith's Mad Dog, 
of Dame Partlet' s farm, in which, straying from 

M 177 



The Perfect Widow 

the farm to its owner, we have most of that lady's 
vh'tues repeated. There are new merits too : — 

Her home-brew'd ale she made so strong, 

The Sexton came and prov'd it ; 
The Rector thought 'twas not amiss— 

And harvest-men all lov'd it. 

Do we see here a cause of the fortunate defection 
of Farmer Tipple ? Can he have acquired his 
taste for liquor . . .} And thus . . . ? 

The tedium (if it is tedium) of the Dame's 
sententidusness and invincible economy and fore- 
sight, for example, is entirely compensated for by 
such a stanza as this : — 

Her dress was always clean and neat, 

Her face was never nasty ; 
She always wash'd her hands before 

She made an apple pasty ; 

and against the somewhat chill Spartanism 
expressed in these lines : — 

To all the poor when sick she went, 
And cheer'd them in their illness ; 

And if they murmur'd in their pain 
She urg'd the use of stillness ; 

we have the Dame's very human way with 
children, as described in the epitaph upon her, 
written by one of Mr. Spellright's young 

178 



The Rewards 

gentlemen^ which Mr. Lovetruth ordered to be 
cut on a fine piece of black marble : — 

To boys and girls who said their pray'rs 

She sent her apples and her pears ; 

To those who never told a lie 

She gave a cheesecake or a pie ; 

To those who learn't their book by heart 

She gave a custard or a tart ; 

But those who best could read and spell, 

Or who in writing did excell, 

Were ever "welcome to her kitchen, 

For cake and sweetmeats she was rich in : 

And those who went to church on Sunday 

W^ere sure to have some buns on Monday ; 

But they who best their collect said 

Received a cake of diet-bread. 

I have described the poetic interlude as being 
in the metre of the Elegy on a Mad Dog, but 
there is an exception^ an artistic blunder^ in one 
stanza. Here probably may be seen the hand of 
Newbery once more. In so far as he coerced 
his hack into introducing advertisements of other 
of the Corner-of-St.-Paurs-Churchyard publica- 
tions^ he was within his rights. And to insist 
upon the introduction of blocks was permissible, 
so long as they did not mar the author's concep- 
tion. Never, of course, if they did ; but, 
grievous to relate, the publisher had by him a 
woodcut which he seems to have determined 
179 



The Perfect Widow 

should go into this little work though the 
heavens fell. It represented a lady walking in a 
trim and expensive garden^ reading a book^ with 
a little spaniel frisking before her. Figure the 
despau' of the author. One seems to hear him 
protesting : ^^ But the Dame read nothing but 
the Bible, and certainly not that out of doors. 
There were no green-houses in her garden. 
What would she want with a toy spaniel ? A 
sheep-dog^ yes." But Newbery was inexorable. 
The result is that^ in the midst of the history of 
the simple^ industrious^ economical Dame of the 
Rector's patronage^ we have this bewildering 
stanza : — 

She daily in the garden walk'd, 

But always took her dog and book, 

And told the gardener to cut 
Some vegetables for the cook. 

A new dame emerges : a great lady. ^^ And 
told the gardener to cut." The dame of the 
earlier and later pages has no gardener and does 
her own cooking. She is not to be conceived of as 
giving these orders. The conscientious student 
of Dame Partlet's character and career will, of 
course, expunge this stanza altogether. 

Even in her death Dame Partlet's radiant good 
sense prevailed. Her biographer remarks : — 

Notwithstanding Dame Partlet died so very 



A Good End 

rich^ she had directed by her will that a great 
deal of money should not be expended on her 
funeral ; for she thought it much better to have 
something given to the poor^ than to have a deal 
spent in making a pompous show over a dead 
body. However^ her son Peter and Farmer 
Safeguard^ whom she left executors^ thought it 
proper to have that respect shown to her last 
remains which her character and situation in life 
required ; therefore they gave directions to Mr. 
Screwdown^ the undertaker^ to have what he 
called a handsome funeral ; which directions you 
may see observed. 

Never did any person die in the village of 
Innocence more lamented^ or whose funeral was 
so numerously attended as that of Dame Partlet. 
Though the Rector was so old and infirm_, yet he 
would attend himself to read the service ; Mrs. 
Teachem w^as in the Squire's pew with all her 
young ladies^ and Mr. Spelhight was present with 
his boarders. The poor people, not only of the 
village^ but from many miles round^ also attended^ 
so that the church was crowded with people, and 
filled with grief and lamentation. 

And so we bid adieu to this exemplary 
character. In death her fame blossoms and 
smells sweet. In life she did nothing amiss^ and 
refrained from writing the biography of her 
husband. 



i«i 



Diana Shoal <:> o- ^> ,-> e> 

T^HERE are names with which one feels one 
will never get upon terms of natural ease : 
names such as, to take examples from the teeming 
life around us, Homer Herring, which 1 noticed 
recently over a provincial milliner's window, or 
L. G. Chiozza Money, the prophet of Free Trade, 
or a tonsorial artist of Kensington, Ciccognani 
Smart. These names hold one as it were at 
arm's length, or at any rate such attraction as 
they exert with one hand is counterbalanced by 
the other. 

And then there are names which directly one 
hears them one feels at home with ; which become 
instantly as familiar as household words. We 
each have our taste, and you may think differ- 
ently ; but to me Diana Shoal is such a name. 

Have you heard it before } How do you 
picture her ? Divinely tall and fair — a huntress — 
a lady shedding sweet influence. Is Diana — 
182 



The Novelists and Diana 

your Diana — like that ? In whose studio do you 
see her regally seated — in Mr. Sargent's^ in Mr. 
Shannon's^ or in John's ? (Don't say John's.) 

Diana Shoal I How is it that when a woman's 
name is suddenly flashed at us we always think 
of her as youngs while a man may be any age ? 
Because^ of course^ you are thinking of Diana 
Shoal as youngs and of course beautiful. I am 
not saying anything as to her age^ but it amused 
me just now to see you imagining such summer 
radiance for her. I should like to proffer her 
as a new heroine to a number of novelists, 
and see what they made of her. How Mr. 
James would develop her introspective tendency 
and that odd trick she had of inserting adverbs 
in the unexpected place. Don't you see Mr. 
Barrie giving her the prettiest impulses, and 
Mr. Hope the gayest insouciant talk ? In Mr. 
Galsworthy's hands the poor thing would be 
trapped within the iron bars of a social system 
hopelessly selfish and insincere ; while in Mr. 
Mason's she would inspire a romantic young hero 
to travel all over the world and back again to 
Cornhill. Mrs. Humphry Ward would marry 
her to an ambitious young statesman, and Mr. 
Hichens, if we allowed him to deal with her 
(which we shouldn't), would move heaven and 
earth to get her into trouble. 

183 



Diana Shoal 

^^ I know ! " I seem to hear some one say, 
^^ Diana Shoal is a new actress. All this farrago 
about her is a pufF." An actress ? The old father 
of Mr, Luther Busk was impayahle ; and of his he- 
witching daughter as played hy Miss Diana Shoal, a 
newcomer at the theatre, what shall we say ? There 
is only one ivord, and that, as usual, is a French one, 
to describe her essential charm : espieglerie. Miss 
Shoal is adorable, even if a little lacking, to a 
hypercritical sense, in what Aristotle called . . . and 
so forth. Do you see that kind of criticism about 
Diana Shoal ? No^ sir, she is not an actress. 

Nor is she a sufFr ? But you never thought 

that. 

But who is Diana Shoal ? you ask with that 
suspicion of irritation which we keep — and very 
properly — for superior persons who play with 
our ignorance. Reader, I will be frank with 
you. I have only first discovered for myself. 
Yesterday I was as ig — as uninformed as you. 

One hears from time to time strange stories 
of bank-notes that are found in old books bought 
for a few pence. M. Uzanne tells one in his 
fascinating volume on the Bouquinistes of the 
Paris quais ; and they occur with some regularity 
in the papers. Thus : — 

A young mechanic at Oswestry has just had the 
good fortune to find a five-pound note between 
184 



Treasure-Trove 

the pages of an old copy of Adam Smith's Wealth 
of Nations which he had bought for twopence. 
The windfall was shared equally between the 
purchaser and the bookseller^ to whom the finder 
honourably and generously told the story. 

That is the kind of thing — except that the con- 
clusion is a little too good for human nature's 
daily food ; I added it myself, having a leaning 
towards the impossible. And in the brave stories 
of treasure-trove, the key to the hiding-place, a 
map painfully traced on yellow paper, falls from 
the family Bible or the folio Hakluyt ; while 
sometimes it is the missing will. 

Although I have bought in my time many 
hundreds of volumes from Twopenny and Four- 
penny Boxes, and many hundreds of volumes 
from the more patrician shelves inside the book- 
seller's shop, no bank-notes ever fluttered from 
their leaves. But in a book which I bought 
yesterday in Marylebone Lane (not a bad little 
street to hunt in), I found the story of Diana Shoal. 

It runs thus, on a single broadsheet : — 

NOTICE TO MARINERS 

{^The hearings are Magnetic, and those concerning 
the visibility of lights are given from seaward) 

NORTH PACIFIC OCEAN 
Unsuccessful search for Diana Shoal 

i8s 



Diana Shoal 

Information has been received from Captain A. 
Mostyn-Field^ H.M. Surveying Vessel Penguin, 
that^ in August 1897^ he sounded over an area 
embracing 80 miles in longitude and nearly 
40 miles in latitude^ in the vicinity of Diana 
Shoal^ originally reported in 1852 as having a 
depth of 6 feet on it^ and as being situated in 
lat. 8' 40' N., long. 157° 20' W. 

The Penguin spent five days in the search, 
obtaining soundings of from 2560 to 2946 
fathoms at distances of 7 to 10 miles apart, and 
observing no indication of a shoal in any part 
of the locality. 

In view of the above^ and the fact that 
schooners have plied for many years between 
Honolulu and Fanning island over the position 
of the shoal, and that it has not been seen since 
the first vague report, Diana Shoal has been 
expunged from the Admiralty Charts. 

By Command of their Lordships, 

W. J. L. Wharton, Hydrographer. 

So my first intimation, you see, concerning 
Diana Shoal was the news that she was no 
more ; it is like the Times obituary column, 
which introduces us every morning to strangers 
of distinction whom noAv we have for ever lost 
the chance of meeting. But you see why I 
laughed when you were so certain she was 
young and beautiful. 



i86 



Winter Solace <:><:>- <s> ^ 

"D Y a happy chance I found myself the other 
^-^ day of frost in the hbrary of a cricket 
enthusiast^ surrounded by most of the literature 
of the great game^ and not a little of its art. I 
had not much time, but I used it to some 
purpose, I think, turning over the leaves with 
an avidity quite equal to that of a connoisseur 
of typography, and being, perhaps, more con- 
tinually rewarded, for interesting human facts are 
commoner than good printing, especially among 
that simple folk the old heroes of bat and ball. 
For, of course, it was to the old rather than the 
new that I resorted. The new are (if it were 
possible) almost too much with us ; but the old, 
how far away ! 

Perhaps the rarest book that I handled was the 
tiny volume of recollections of cricket by Lord 
Charles Russell, of which twelve copies, and twelve 
only, were printed in 1879^ for the members of his 

187 



Winter Solace 

lordship's team at Woburn Abbey. The little 
brochure is only thirty-nine pages long, consisting, 
in its author's words, of a single over, the first 
ball of which was contributed — as the copy which 
I saw attested in his lordship's hand — by the late 
George Richmond, R.A., under the pseudonym of 
^^ Octogenarian." 

Of what is the old man thinking 
As he leans on his oaken staff? 

is the motto. Of what but cricket, of course ! 
Of what else should old men be thinking } Lord 
Frederick Beauclerk, W. Ward, Esq., Lilly white 
(the Nonpareil), George Parr, and Lord Charles 
Russell himself — these were his brave thoughts. 
One story which he gives of old Lilly (not Lilly 
the grammarian, by any means) — the old Lilly 
—is new to me : ^^ I suppose," he remarked to 
Mr. Richmond, ^^ I suppose if I was to think 
every ball, they wouldn't ever get a run." What 
a game to watch — old Lilly thinking every ball ! 
^^ But," he added, ^^ three balls out of four straight 
is what we calls mediogrity." Who would have 
guessed that word ? Lord Charles Russell, 
under the alluring title Rowid-arm Recollections, 
has another story of Lilly, to the effect that he 
often refused a hard chance of c. and b. with the 
remark, as he glanced at the magical right hand 
i88 



Lord Charles Russell 

which had been drawn out of danger : ^^ Ha ! 
where would you be without my bowling ? '' — 
^^ bowling'' being very properly pronounced by 
the Nonpareil to rhyme with ^^ fowling." This 
little book^ by the way^ is an excellent example 
of what one might call gentlemen's literature^ 
privately printed of course. I should like a book- 
case of such volumes^ and^ indeed, I have a few^ in- 
cluding the priceless record of the Allah-hakbaris' 
Eleven. There lies before me a copy of the 
letter in which Lord Charles Russell bade fare- 
well to the active game, in I86I. ^^I shall be 
delighted/' he wrote to his son, Henry Russell, 
^^ to coach you in cricket, but I play no more. 
My last match was creditable — 8 singles well 
but slowly got, and bowled by a very first-rate 
ball. I took off my cap when I received the 
applause of the Pavilion : and, as John retires 
from the scene of his glory before his powers 
leave him, so I take leave of cricket. Next 
season I shall be nearer sixty than thirty, so 
Cricket society can no longer have a claim on 
me." John was Lord John Russell, w ho had just 
accepted a peerage. 

Another story of old Lilly I find in one of 

Frederick Gale's genial volumes, The Game of 

Cricket : " I remember one night " — Fuller Pilch 

is speaking — ^' when there was a concert. Mr. 

189 



Winter Solace 

Felix was playing in the band^ and old Lillywhite 
was sitting behind him and saw the music. 
^Mister Felix/ he said^ ^you're bound to have an 
overthrow or two among all those crooked notes.' " 
This book^ by the way^ was presented by its 
author to the late Bob Thorns^ best of umpires 
and most sterling of independent dependants 
(that fine class of men). A scrap of the old man's 
dignified writing — for Bob wrote a good self- 
conscious letter — was in it^ sent^ evidently, with 
the book to a friend and returned by accident 
in its pages : — 

The ^^ Old Buffer's" book I think will please 
you ; which can be returned, when its contents 
have been leisurely scanned ; and digested. — 
Truly yours, Rob. Thoms 

Felix was not only the perfect bat of his day, 
but an author on the game too ; for it is a mistake 
to think that it is a new thing for great cricketers 
to write about their art. On the contrary, they 
always did it a little: Lambert in 181 6, Nyren 
in 1833, Felix in 1845, and Old Clark (in 
William BoUand's book Cricket Notes) in 1851. 
Lambert's book, you observe, was the earliest. 
This was the same William Lambert of whose 
cousin I wrote in the essay on George Mariner. 
What share he had in his Instructions and Rules 
190 



"Felix on the Bat" 

for Playing the Xoble Game of Cricket I know 
not ; but he confesses to help from his pubUsher. 
The result is lacking in character^ and is chiefly 
interesting for the frontispiece, depicting a match 
at Lewes, in Sussex. Publishers and authors are 
not ideal collaborators ; the lion does not easily 
and naturally lie down with the lamb, except, as 
the old wit said, Avith the lamb inside. Felix, 
however, is different. Felix was a rhetorician 
Avith an orotund capacity, and he made his 
book, Felix on the Bat, a very gentlemanly piece 
of eloquence. Quotations abound in it, and 
the first chapter, on ^^ Batting," begins like 
this : — 

Miserable indeed must that age be in which 
the empire of the women is lost, and in which 
the judgment of the fairer sex is counted as 
nothing. . . , Glance your eye over the civilised 
portions of this globe, and you will be struck with 
the beautiful conviction that where the fairer 
sex are admitted to witness the happiness of those 
who, escaping from the turmoil of business, essay 
to shake off the monotonous responsibilities of 
their different avocations by healthful recreation, 
there the character of the men receives a much 
higher tone, and, animated with an additional 
spirit by their presence and by the smile of their 
encouraging approbation, cheerfulness pervades 
the sport. Long may the customs of our land 
suffer them to come amongst us, and long may 
191 



Winter Solace 

the manliness of this noble game deserve their 
patronising influence ! 

The gallant Felix ! Yet the glory of his book 
is not his courteous and polished pen, but the 
coloured plates of gentlemen making correct 
strokes, beneath (no doubt) the eyes of the 
fascinated and enthusiastic fair — with the famous 
frontispiece of Felix riding high above a cricket 
field, Ariel-like, on a flitter-mouse — Felix 07i the 
Bat 

I mentioned just now William BoUand's book, 
which is valuable for containing Old Clark's letter 
on bowling, and interesting both in itself and 
because William Bolland, Esq., was in real life 
Thackeray's Fred Bayham. One story told by 
this gentleman is worth repeating : Eleven 
Greenwich pensioners with only one leg were 
playing eleven Greenwich pensioners with only 
one arm, and the one-legged won. During the 
match one of the batting veterans lost his 
leg as he ran between the wickets, but, like 
Witherington, he fought upon his stump, for he 
hopped on to complete his run. Before, however, 
he could do so, the one-armed point had seized 
the wooden limb and thrown down the wicket 
with it — with an aim worthy of Long John 
Silver, under somewhat dissimilar conditions, but 
192 



A Golden Wish 

with the identical missile. Now comes the 
tragedy : the dastard umpire gave the hero out — 
under what rule neither I nor Fred Bayham have 
the slightest notion. It is said that the poor 
man ^'^wept aloud" as he buckled on his leg 
once more. Had he sworn^ surely Uncle Toby's 
angel w^ould have dropped again his obliterating 
tear. 

So much for the printed matter of this collec- 
tion^ which runs_, I suppose^ to thousands of 
volumes. Let me close my bee-like sippings at 
its sweets with a few words from the letter of 
Mary Turner_, of East Hoadly^ in Sussex^ to her 
son Philip at Brighton^ on September 2, 1789^ 
which I once placed with so much pleasure 
on the title-page of a reprint of Nyren. She 
begins thus : ^^ According to my promises have 
sent you one peice of nankeen and a few peares^ 
wich I hope will com safe to hand. Last 
Munday*' — and this is the golden heart of this 
old missive — ^^last Munday youre Father was at 
Mr. Payn's and plaid at cricket^ and came home 
please anuf, for he struck the best ball in the 
game^ and whishd he had not anny thing else to 
do he would play at Cricket all his Life.'' There 
is the true spirit : ^^ All his life." I too. 

I too ; but of com'se it cannot be. Father Time 
sees to that ; and during the snowstorm in which 
N 193 



Winter Solace 

i write these lines the unUkelihood of the sun 
ever shining again on my flannelled limbs is 
peculiarly emphatic. It is a nightmare that 
pursues me through every autumn^ winter^ and 
early spring. How can there be another season ? 
one asks one's self; just as years ago^ a fort- 
night before the holidays^ one was convinced 
that the end of the world must intervene. The 
difference between the child and the middle- 
aged man merely is that the child expects 
the end of the world — the man the end of 
himself. 

Looking out of the frosted windows of memory^ 
in these days of colds and pessimism — the 
cricketer's dark ages — I seem to see most clearly 
the gentleman visitor who came over with the 

B team in June and hit me out of the ground 

twice in the first over. He was the more notable 
because his appearance conveyed nothing of his 
merit. The only danger signal was the blazer of 
a well-known touring club ; but I am old enough 
to know how fallacious can be the testimony of 
a blazer. The biggest muff in the field can wear 
the best colours. He walked to the wicket 
without any particular confidence ; but I was 
conscious of a twinge as I saw his swift glance 
round the field. He then hit my first ball clean 
out of it ; from my second he made two ; from 
194 



The Gentlemen Strangers 

the third another two ; the fourth and fifth 
wanted playing ; and the sixth he hit over my 
head among some distant haymakers. Altogether 
he made 68. 

These gentlemen strangers are the second things 
we always look for as the enemy's brake draws up 
at the gate. The first thing we look for is the fast 
bowler. If he is absent our hearts give a bounds 
and then we are free^ with less trepidation^ to ex- 
amine the foe for surprises. Now it is that our eyes 
search out the strangers and size them up. Half 
the subsidiary fun of village cricket — counting the 
game itself as the primary fun — lies in noting the 
difference^ or resemblance^, between our fears as 
to these strangers and their performance ; and it 
is intensified when they are gentlemen visitors. 
Because^ in a kind of inarticulate way^ we are 
democrats ; we do not want gentlemen visitors, 
although they are welcome enough when they 
come. Hence to see the genuine half-holiday 
player getting the better of the gentleman visitor 
pleases us. Our regular gentlemen antagonists — 
residents whom we know and have long striven 
with — we welcome all the way ; it is these aliens 
from public schools and universities, who have had 
the benefit of the best training and know all the 
tricks and slang of the game, whom we a little 
resent and in whose discomfiture we delight. 
195 



Winter Solace 

The contents of the visiting brake is not 
always a surprise. I'here are occasions — particu- 
larly before a return match when the first was 
won by ourselves — when tidings reach us over- 
night that our foes are (in the pleasant cricket 
idiom) ^^ mixing it up hot '' for us^ and are 
going to borrow D and C from E^ E having no 
match on the morrow. Some flushed scout 
brings the news into the village on his bicycle 
and it spreads like fire. It is then that the 
glance which we throw towards the brake the 
next day is exceptionally keen. 

Now and then it happens^ of course^ that the 
gentleman visitor has a name famous in history — 
a county man or an Old Blue. But the ironical 
stars^ whose interest in cricket never fails^ see 
to it that these do not trouble us much. By a 
curious chance,, amounting almost to a law^ none 
of the great cracks bat so well among villagers as 
in the first-class game. It is partly^ as I say, the 
work of the stars, but not a little credit must be 
given to our umpires. The most illustrious of 
batsmen at this moment was telling me last 
year, during an interval at Lord's, how in a 
village game on the previous Saturday he 
had been given out leg-before for stepping 
across his wicket to a wide-pitched ball and 
bending his pads down to it in the approved (but 
196 



An Educational Reform 

very vile) first-class manner. ^^ How's that ? " 
the scandalised bowler had asked ^ and the 
umpire^ chosen probably for his courageous 
orthodoxy with regard to pad and leather, 
deeming every union illicit, had immediately given 
the only answer possible to his almost episcopal 
mind : ^^ Hout." 

It is probable, if the truth were known, that 
more county matches have been won by umpires 
than either batsmen or bowlers ; so what must it 
be in our untutored variety of the game, where 
umpires are chosen less from fitness to adjudicate 
than from mere bodily presence on the field at 
the given moment — so rarely the time, and the 
place, and the just one altogether! None the 
less, with all their incredible stupidity and 
nepotism, I take immense pleasure in village 
umpires, and can honestly say that never have 
I questioned their decisions against me or 
shown any anger at their mistakes. I do not say 
this boastingly, because, after all, one must play 
the game ; but I could wish that others were as 
free from that particular fault. The last thing 
but one that village cricketers learn is to judge 
a run. The last thing, is to be decent to their 
umpires. If I were a squire or parson with the 
village school under my thumb, I should com- 
promise with the theologians by having a class 
197 



Winter Solace 

in manners at which behaviour to umpires should 
be taught just as spelling and ciphering are taught. 
A boy who behaved well to an umpire would 
behave well to every one. Christianity would 
follow automatically. 



198 



A Rhapsodist at Lord's o- o o 

nnO the readers of the memoir of the late 
Francis Thompson which stands as preface 
to the volume of his Selected Poems, it must 
have come as a surprise to learn that this 
rapt celebrant of the soul was^ if not himself a 
cricketer^ a very keen student of the game. 
They would have felt surprise not because there 
is anything irreconcilable between the life 
spiritual and this noble pastime^ but because one 
naturally falls into the habit of thinking of men 
in one direction only and Thompson's name 
carried with it the idea rather of midnight visions 
than of the sunlit pitch. 

But literary genius and love of cricket have 
joined hands before. Cowper at Westminster 
was eager for the game. Byron played for 
Harrow against Eton. Mr. Meredith^ whose 
cricket enthusiasm flushes through his novels^ 
>vas^ he has told me^ an alert fieldsman at the 

?99 



A Rhapsodist at Lord's 

point of the bat ; while Mr. Barrie^ it is well 
known^ goes so far as to possess a team of his 
own whose merits he has described in an illus- 
trated brochure which is at once the joy of those 
who own it and the despair of those who do not. 
Two instances of what I may call wholly un- 
expected cricketers may be added. Mr. Lang, 
by whose cradle the muse of the game, benign- 
antly smiling^ most assuredly stood with gifts in 
her hand, has discovered that Cuchulainn, the 
Irish hero, played, and naturally excelled, at 
cricket in its most primitive form about 200 a.d., 
while (and here we come nigher the poet of 
^^ The Hound of Heaven ") if you look in Mr. 
Philip Norman's fascinating history of the West 
Kent Cricket Club you will find the name and 
fame of one H. E. Manning, afterwards Cardinal. 
None the less it was a surprise to many persons, 
as I say, to find that Francis Thompson was a 
devotee too ; and to those who had seen him in 
the flesh (and in the ulster which he did not don 
until the swallows were with us nor doff until 
they had floAvn) the surprise must have been 
greater still, since from such an exterior it would 
require a reader of men of supernatural acumen 
to deduce a love of open-air sport. For of all 
men Francis Thompson was to the casual ob- 
server least like a cricketer. It was not only 

20Q 



One Against the World 

this inverted affection for his overcoat ; it was 
the whole effect^ the ejisejnble, as Whitman would 
say. If ever a figure seemed to say ^^Take me 
any where in the world so long as it is not to 
a cricket match/' that was Francis Thompson's. 
And his eye supported it. His eye had no 
brightness : it swung laboriously upon its object ; 
whereas the enthusiasts of St. John's Wood dart 
their glances like birds. 

But Francis Thompson was born to baffle the 
glib inference. With his heart warmed by the 
very presence of God he could sell matches at 
Charing Cross. The worlds which at every turn 
seemed to have crushed him beneath its cold 
weighty he had mastered and disdained while still 
a youth. Fate might beat against his frame^ but 
within blossomed the rose. He carried his con- 
solations. 

Latterly he went seldom to Lord's. His 
memories were too sad. It was indeed from this 
sadness^ this regret for the past and unwillingness 
to recall it too vividly^ that was born the poem a 
stanza of which was printed in The AthencEum, 
and which^ with other verses on the game^ I am 
permitted to print in full here. The poem is 
not dated^ but it is recent. As I understand 
the case,, Thompson had been invited to Lord's 
to see Middlesex and Lancashire^ and had agreed 



A Rhapsodist at Lord's 

to go ; but as the time drew near he found he 
could not face the ordeal. Such a mood imports 
a new note into cricket poetry. Cricket poetry 
hitherto has been descriptive, reflective, rapturous, 
gay, humorous. It has never before to my know* 
ledge been made a vehicle for a lament for the 
past of profoundest melancholy. 

Every one knows the sadness of the backw^ard 
look — every one has lost friends both of kin and 
of the soul. But the cricket enthusiast (and this 
applies to other spectacular games and sports too), 
whether iie plays or merely watches, has had two 
pasts, two chances of bereavement — -his own 
private losses, and the losses that have been 
suffered by the game. It is impossible for a quite 
ordinary enthusiast to see one match without 
thinking'of an earlier : how much more then must 
a poet do so ? The simplest and most prosaic of 
us, whose lives have been fortunate, cannot go 
to Lord's and regret no missing face upon the 
field. How have we, for example, yearned for 
Mr. Stoddart these many seasons past! But 
Thompson. . . . 

Francis Thompson was Lancashire born ; as a 
boy he haunted the Old Trafford ground. Then 
came the realities of life, which in many cases 
were too much for him : his body was frail, he 
suffered alrnost constant pain, he was unfitted 
203 



Hornby and Barlow 

doubly — physically and temperamentally — for 
mundane struggle. He left Ushaw^ made a futile 
experiment or two to earn his living in the 
ordinary way^ and drifted to London_, where he 
fell upon the hardest times^ always^ however (in 
the beautiful image that Pater uses of Marius)^ 
protecting unsullied the white bird in his breast^ 
always secure in his soul^ but none the less con- 
scious too that things were not as they should be 
with him and as they had promised to be in the 
days before thought^ before the real fight^ began 
— in the days when Hornby and Barlow went in 
first for Lancashire. To know all this is to find 
the first and last stanza of the poem which follows 
almost unbearably sad. 

It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk, 

Though my own red roses there may blow ; 
It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk, 

Though the red roses crest the caps I know. 
For the field is full of shades as I near the shadowy coast, 
And a ghostly batsman plays to the bowling of a ghost, 
And I look through my tears on a soundless clapping 
host, 

As the run-stealers flicker to and fro, 
To and fro. 

O my Hornby and my Barlow long ago ! 

It is Glo'ster coming North, the irresistible, 

The Shire of the Graces, long ago ! 
It is Gloucestershire up North the irresistible. 

And new-arisen Lancashire the foe ! 

?03 



A Rhapsodist at Lord's 

A Shire so young that has scarce impressed its traces, 
Ah, how shall it stand before all resistless Graces? 
O, little red rose, their bats are as maces 

To beat thee down, this summer long ago ! 

This day of seventy-eight they are come up North against 
thee, 
This day of seventy- eight, long ago. 
The champion of the centuries, he cometh up against 
thee, 
With his brethren, every one a famous foe ! 
The long-whiskered Doctor, that laugheth rules to scorn, 
While the bowler, pitched against him, bans the day that 

he was born ; 
And G. F. with his science makes the fairest length 
forlorn ; 
They are come from the West to work thee woe ! 

It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk. 

Though my own red roses there may blow ; 
It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk, 

Though the red roses crest the caps I know. 
For the field is full of shades as I near the shadowy 

coast. 
And a ghostly batsman plays to the bowling of a ghost. 
And I look through my tears on a soundless clapping 
host. 
As the run-stealers flicker to and fro. 

To and fro. 
O my Hornby and my Barlow long ago ! 

I might say that the match in question was 

played at Old Traflford on July 25, 26, 21, 1878, 

when the poet was eighteen. (He was born in 

December, 1859-) It was an historic contest^ 

204 



The Rival Roses 

for the two counties had never before met. 
The fame of the Graces was such that 16^000 
people were present on the Saturday^ the thh'd 
day — of whom^ by the w^ay^ 2000 did not pay but 
took the ground by storm. The result was a 
draw^ a Httle in Lancashire's favour, after a very 
determined fight interrupted now and then by 
rain. It was eminently Hornby and Barlow's 
match. In the first innings the amateur made 
only 5, but Barlow went right through it^ his 
wicket falling last for 40. In the second innings 
Hornby was at his best_, making with incredible 
dash 100 out of 156 while he was in^ Barlow 
supporting him while he made 80 of them. In this 
match W. G. made 32 and 58 not out and took 
4 wickets^ and E. M. made 21 and 4 and took 4 
wickets. G. F. played too^ but it was not his 
day. 

The notebook in which the verses are written 
contains many variations upon several of the 
lines. 

O my Hornby and my Barlow long ago ! 

becomes in one case 

O my Monkey and Stone- waller long ago ! 

'^ Monkey " was^ of course^ Mr. Hornby's nick- 
name. ^^ First he runs you out of breath/' said 
the professional^ possibly Barlow himself, ^- first he 
205 



A Rhapsodist at Lord's 

runs you out of breathy then he runs you out^ 
and then he gives you a sovereign." A brave 
summary ! In what other verse he and Barlow 
have a place I do not know^ but they should be 
proud of this. It is something to have brought 
tears to the eyes of the poet of Sister Songs. 
He^ that unworldly ecstatic visionary^ is no more^ 
but both cricketers are happily alive to-day — 
(I was talking to Barlow only last year^ and 
such was his vivacity he seemed to have drunk 
of the fountain of youth) — and they may read 
these verses. I hope they will^ although 
cricketers^ in my experience^ however they may 
have taken of late to writing of their game^ 
read as little as they can. 

The second piece is a description^ in very easy 
couplets^ of the great match between Middlesex 
and Yorkshire at Lord's on May 28, 1899- It 
was never intended for print : it was merely a 
versified memorandum of the match for the 
writer s own amusement. As will some day be 
seen, his notebooks took count of most of his 
experiences, trivial as well as serious. A few 
lines may be quoted. Albert Trott, it will be 
remembered, after Warner had paved the way 
by making an historic 150, hit up in hurri- 
cane style 164. The rhymes thus describe his 



206 



Alberto 

For Trott, who also month-long kept 

Inert, as the batsman in him slept, 

Wakes, and with tumult of his waking, 

The many-girded ground is shaking ! 

With rolling claps and clamour, as soar 

Fours after fours, and ever four ! 

Bowls Rhodes, bowls Jackson, Haigh bowls, Hirst, — 

To him the last is as the first : 

West-end tent or pavilion-rail, 

He lashes them home with a thresher's flail. 

I omit a curious interlude in which the psycho- 
logical state of Lord Hawke^ as captain^ is 
delineated : not too accurately^ I fancy^ for his 
lordship^ if I know anything about him, can 
meet adversity with philosophic calm. This is 
the end : — 

Trott keeps them trotting, till his d d score 

Is just one hundred, sixty, and four, — 

The highest tally this match has scored. 

And the century fourth is long up on the board. 

Thank Heaven, the fellows's grown reckless now, 

Jumps and slogs at them anyhow : 

Two narrow shaves, amid frenzied howl 

Of jubilant people, and lordly growl ; 

Till a clinker tingles in Brown's left hand — 

Good Brown ! you have snapped the infernal stand ! 

The last two wickets go tedious down. 

And my lord strides off with his teeth and frown. 

The poet throughout,, although no Southerner, 
is against Yorkshire ; the old championship of 
the Red Rose against the White coming out very 

207 



A Rhapsodist at Lord's 

strongly. The match ended in a victory for 
Middlesex by an innings and 2 runs. It was 
Trott's game^ for not only did he score his l64 
(137 of them in an hour and a half)^ but he took 
altogether nine wickets. 

The third piece is a tour de force, an imitation 
of FitzGerald's ^^ Omar.'' Thompson^ who was 
not given to filling other men's moulds^ began it 
evidently as a joke^ for he gave it a comic title^ 
^^ Rime o' bat of O my sky-em." But his mind 
was too.powerful and proud for imitation or sus- 
tained /acdzct?^ and he quickly became individual 
and human^ so that the stanzas^, although a parody 
in form^ are also a new and independent thing. 
They seem to me to have no little charm. Cricket 
no doubt has been moralised before — indeed is 
there not Fred Lillywhite's epitaph in Highgate 
Cemetery ? — but never so sw eetly and reasonably. 

Part I 

Wake ! for the Ruddy Ball has taken flight 
That scatters the slow Wicket of the Night ; 

And the swift Batsman of the Dawn has driven 
Against the Star-spiked Rails a fiery Smite. 

Wake, my Beloved ! take the Bat that clears 
The sluggish Liver, and Dyspeptics cheers : 

To-morrow ? Why, to-morrow I may be 
Myself with Hambledon and all its Peers. 
208 



Omar at the Wicket 

To-day a Score of Batsmen brings, you say ? 
Yes, but where leaves the Bats of yesterday ? 

And this same summer day that brings a Knight 
May take the Grace and Ranjitsinjh away. 

Willsher the famed is gone with all his ^'throws." 
And Alfred's Six-foot Reach where no man knows ; 

And Hornby — that great hitter — his own Son 
Plays in his place, yet recks not the Red Rose. 

And Silver Billy, Fuller Pilch and Small, 
Alike the pigmy Briggs and Ulyett tall, 

Have swung their Bats an hour or two before, 
But none played out the last and silent Ball. 

Well, let them Perish ! What have we to do 
With Gilbert Grace the Great, or that Hindu ? 

Let Hirst and Spooner slog them as they list, 
Or Warren bowl his "snorter": care not you ! 

With me along the Strip of Herbage strown. 
That is not laid or watered, rolled or sown, 

Where name of Lord's and Oval is forgot. 
And peace to Nicholas on his bomb-girt Throne. 

A level Wicket, as the Ground allow, 
A driving Bat, a lively Ball, and thou 

Before me bowling on the Cricket-pitch — • 

Cricket-pitch were Paradise enow ! 

Part H 

1 listened where the Grass was shaven small. 
And heard the Bat that groaned against the Ball : 

Thou pitchest Here and There, and Left and Right, 
Nor deem I where the Spot thou next may'st Fall. 
O 209 



A Rhapsodist at Lord's 

Forward I play, and Back, and Left and Right, 
And overthrown at once, or stay till Night : 

But this I know, where nothing else I know, 
The last is Thine, how so the Bat shall smite. 

This thing is sure, where nothing else is sure, 
The boldest Bat may but a Space endure ; 

And he who One or who a Hundred hits 
Falleth at ending to thy Force or Lure. 

Wherefore am I allotted but a Day 

To taste Delight, and make so brief a stay ; 

For meed of all my Labour laid aside, 
Ended alike the Player and the Play. 

Behold, there is an Arm behind the Ball, 
Nor the Bat's Stroke of its own Striking all ; 

And who the Gamesters, to what end the Game, 
I think thereof our Willing is but small. 

Against the Attack and Twist of Circumstance 
Though I oppose Defence and shifty Glance, 

What Power gives Nerve to me, and what Assaults, 
This is the Riddle. Let dull bats cry '^ Chance." 

Is there a Foe that [domineers] the Ball ? 

And one that Shapes and wields us Willows all ? 

Be patient if Thy Creature in Thy Hand 
Break, and the so-long-guarded Wicket fall ! 

Thus spoke the Bat. Perchance a foolish Speech 
And wooden, for a Bat has straitened Reach : 

Yet thought I, I had heard Philosophers 
Prate much on this wise, and aspire to Teach, 
210 



Edgar Willsher 

Ah, let us take our Stand, and play the Game, 
But rather for the Cause than for the Fame ; 
Albeit right evil is the Ground, and we 
Know our Defence thereon will be but lame. 

O Love, if thou and I could but Conspire 
Against this Pitch of Life, so false with Mire, 
Would we not Doctor it afresh, and then 
Roll it out smoother to the Bat's Desire? 

A few notes would not be out of place. Hamble- 
don is the village in Hampshire where the game 
was first taken with all the seriousness of a religious 
rite^ as^ of course^ it should be. The history of 
the Hambledon cricketers was written by John 
Nyren in 1833^ in a wonderful little book still 
available in reprints. I suppose that the Knight 
wiiom Thompson had in mind was Albert Knight 
of Leicestershire^ whose writings on cricket he 
greatly admired. Willsher was Edgar Willsher^ 
^^ The Lion of Kent/' and a member of the All 
England team^ born in 1828. A ^^ fast and rip- 
ping " left-handed round-arm bowler^ in or about 
1857 his style came under severe criticism in 
BelVs Life, but he survived the attack. Mr. 
Haygarth calls him ^^ one of the most amiable^ as 
wxll as one of the staunchest^ of cricketers in the 
world." 

To the name of Alfred the poet himself has put 
the following glowing footnote : ^^ Alfred is Alfred 

211 



A Rhapsodist at Lord's 

the Great^ Alfred Mynn^ W. G. of his day ; six 
foot two^ shoulder of mutton fist^ foot on which 
he leaned made a grave in soft turf^ brilliant both 
as bat and fast bowler/' 1 need only add that 
Alfred Mynn was born at Goudhurst in 1807^ and 
was bm-ied at Thm'nham_, also in Kent^ in I86I, 
mourned by all Englishmen. The younger Hornby 
— A. H. — is captain of Lancashire. Silver Billy 
was William Beldham^ of the Hambledon Club, 
over whose genius Nyren becomes lyrical. He 
lived to a very great age and died in I860. 
Fuller Pilch, a Norfolk man by birth, was the 
best bat in England between 1820 and 1850. 
He played for Kent in the thirties and forties, 
and died at Canterbury in 1870, — 

Land of Hops, and you hold in trust 
Very sacred human dust ! 

There were two Smalls, both Hambledon men 
celebrated by Nyren. Briggs was of course 
Johnny Briggs, of Thompson's own county, the 
left-handed bowler and cover-point whose end 
was a tragedy, for he lost his reason through a 
sunstroke and died in an asylum. George Ulyett 
is dead too — the great and genial Yorkshireman 
of the seventies. The other names need no 
gloss. 

Those are the verses. Thompson wrote also 
212 



Vernon Royle 

a little prose on the game^ including a lengthy 
criticism of The Jubilee Book of Cricket. 
This review^ printed in The Academy, for 
September 4^ 1897, is interesting not only on 
the literary side but for its theoretical acumen 
too. It contains a very minute examination of 
the differences between the pitched-up balls of 
the under- arm and the over-arm bowler, and 
there are some discerning remarks upon back 
and forward play. But more to our purpose as 
illustrating Thompson's cricket prose is the 
passage in praise of Vernon Royle, another 
Lancashire man, at cover-point : — 

Fine fielding is very largely the work of a 
captain who is himself a fine fielder, and knows 
its vast importance in winning matches. Many a 
match has been won rather in the field than at 
the wicket. And, if only a boy will set himself 
really to study its niceties, it is a most fascinating 
branch of cricket. Prince Ranjitsinhji remarks 
on the splendid opportunities of cover-point, 
and cites the Rev. Vernon Royle as the cover- 
point to whom all cricketers give the palm during 
the last thirty years. ^^ From what one hears," 
he says, ^^he must have been a magnificent 
fielder." He was. And I notice the fact, 
because Vernon Royle may be regarded as a 
concrete example of the typical fielder^ and the 
typical fielder's value. He was a pretty and 
stylish bat ; but it was for his wonderful fielding 

213 



A Rhapsodist at Lord's 

that he was played. A ball for which hardly 
another cover-pomt would think of trying, he 
flashed upon, and with a single action stopped it 
and returned it to the wicket. So placed that 
only a single stump was visible to him, he would 
throw that down with unfailing accuracy, and 
without the slightest pause for aim. One of the 
members of the Australian team in Royle's era, 
playing against Lancashire, shaped to start for a 
hit wide of cover-point. ^^No, noT' cried his 
partner ; ^^ the policeman is there ! '' There were 
no short runs anywhere in the neighbourhood of 
Royle. He simply terrorised the batsmen ; nor 
was there any necessity for an extra cover — now 
so constantly employed. In addition to his sure- 
ness and swiftness, his style was a miracle of 
grace. Slender and symmetrical, he moved with 
the lightness of a young roe, the flexuous elegance 
of a leopard — it was a sight for an artist or a poet 
to see him field. Briggs, at his best, fell not far 
short in efficiency ; but there was no comparison 
between the two in style and elegance. To be a 
fielder like Vernon Royle is as much worth any 
youth's endeavours as to be a batsman like 
Ranjitsinhji, or a bowler like Richardson. 

That the author of The Howid of Heaven and 
The Anthem of Earth should be also the most 
ingenious and suggestive reviewer of Prince 
Ranjitsinhji's Vvork is a curious circumstance 
worthy of note by any Isaac Disraeli of the 
future, who should also make a memorandum 
214 



A Poet's Death 

of the circumstance that when this rapturous 
visionary lay dying in the Roman Catholic 
hospital in St. John's Wood the volume which 
he asked for and kept within touch beneath his 
pillow was Mr. Jacobs' Many Cargoes. 



215 



On a Bookseller's Mistake ^ >^ «<^ 

T HAVE been shocked and pained and a little 
outraged by a classified catalogue that reached 
me this morning from a second-hand bookseller 
whom I know and esteem ; for one of its sections 
is entitled ^^ Motoring and Coaching." Now here is 
a treacherous thing on the part of a second-hand 
bookseller^ a confessed champion of what is old 
and desirable ! Could anything be more traitorous 
to his trust than to group together such irrecon- 
cilables^ such essential foes^ as the mechanical 
mushroom volumes that motoring has produced 
and the old leisurely full-flavoured gentlemanly 
eulogies of the Tantivy Trot ? 

Motoring and Coaching — how can they be 
associated ? Every pleasant thought that the word 
coaching brings to the mind — all its rich and 
mellow connotation — Mr. Pickwick — Nimrod — 
old prints — the music of the hoofs — Tom Brown s 
School Days — the scent of the horses — Yuba Bill 
216 



Four-in-Hand 

— the crack of the whip — Albert Pell — the notes 
of the horn_, near or far — the bustle of the ostlers 
— Egerton Warburton's songs — the cobbled yards 
— John Browdie — the landlord at the door — Jem 
Selby's ruddy face — the old world and its leisure 
— all this is dispersed into thin air in a moment 
by the mere proximity of a car, its rattles and 
tremors, its groans and effluvia, its hard materialism 
and its unrighteous speed. 

Who ever had any conversation in a motor-car ? 
Nor, indeed, is good conversation possible in a 
train ; but coaches seem to have been full of it 
inside and out. Listen to this : — 

" And the Punches," said William. " There's 
cattle ! A Suffolk Punch, when he's a good 'un, 
is worth his weight in gold. Did you ever breed 
any Suffolk Punches yourself, sir ? " 

^^N — no," I said, ^-not exactly." 

^' Here's a gen'lm'n behind me, I'll pound 
it," said William, ^^as has bred 'em by whole- 
sale." 

The gentleman spoken of was a gentleman 
with a very unpromising squint, and a prominent 
chin, who had a tall white hat on with a narrow 
flat brim, and whose close-fitting drab trousers 
seemed to button all the way up outside his legs, 
from his boots to his hips. His chin was cocked 
over the coachman's shoulder, so near to me that 
his breath quite tickled the back of my head ; 
and as I looked round at him, he leered at the 
217 



On a Bookseller's Mistake 

leaders with the eye with which he didn't squint, 
in a very knowing manner. 

^^ Ain't you ? " said WilHam. 

" Ain't I what ? " asked the gentleman 
behind. 

^^ Bred them Suffolk Punches wholesale } " 

^^ I should think so/' said the gentleman. 
^^ There ain't no sort of orse that I ain't bred^ and 
no sort of dorg. Orses and dorgs is some men's 
fancy. They're wittles and drink to me — 
lodging, wife, and children — reading, writing, 
and 'rithmetic — snuff, tobacker, and sleep." 

It is scenes like that which bring home to us 
the loss that we suffer by the disappearance of 
the coach. For although one meets interesting 
strangers in railway carriages, and occasionally 
overhears an odd or humorous conversation or 
remark, yet there is no real comparison. Char- 
acters, apparently so common on the roofs of 
coaches (and, indeed, inside, for was it not inside 
a coach that Lamb made his answer to the 
talkative man who asked what were the pro- 
spects of the turnip season : '^ It depends on 
the boiled legs of mutton " ?) are now few and 
far between. Between the coachman and the 
engine-driver, whether of train or car, there is 
also all the difference in the world : one dealing 
in nerves and muscle and temperament, with 
^Hhe friend of man" at its most urgent and 
218 



Mr. Pecksniff's Analogy 

capable ; and the other merely pullmg cranks 
and opening valves. 

That scrap of coach-roof conversation — the 
last portion of which ought to be cut in letters of 
gold and placed over the doorways of Tattersall's 
and Aldridge's (those strongholds of right 
feeling) — comes of course from Dickens^ whose 
Pegasus^ one might say^ was a leader or wheeler 
on the road. Without coaches to amuse and 
inspire him there would almost have been no 
Dickens. He loved them — loved everything 
about them^ and was never so happy as 
when he could fit his characters in them or 
on them. Do you remember Mr. Pecksniff, 
during the first stage between Salisbury and 
London ? 

^^That he might the better feed and cherish 
that sacred flame of gratitude in his breast^ Mr. 
Pecksniff remarked that he would trouble his 
eldest daughter^ even in this early stage of their 
journey^ for the brandy bottle. And from the 
narrow neck of that stone vessel^ he imbibed a 
copious refreshment. 

^^What are we?" said Mr. Pecksniff^ '^^ but 
coaches ? — Some of us are slow coaches " 

'- Goodness^ Pa ! '' cried Charity. 

'' Some of us^ I say/' resumed her parent with 
increased emphasis^ ^' are slow coaches ; some of 
us are fast coaches. Our passions are the horses^ 

and rampant animals too ! " 

219 



On a Bookseller's Mistake 

'^ Really, Pa ! " cried both the daughters at 
once. ^^ How very unpleasant.'' 

^^And rampant animals too!" repeated Mr. 
Pecksniff, with so much determination, that he 
may be said to have exhibited, at that moment, 
a sort of moral rampancy himself : ^^ and Virtue is 
the drag. We start from Tlie Mother's Arms 
and we run to The Dust Shovel." 

When he had said this, Mr. Pecksniff, being 
exhausted, took some further refreshment. 

An earlier coach lover was, I find, the un- 
fortunate Prince Lee Boo of the Pelew Islands, 
who was more attracted by coaches on his brief 
sojourn in England than by anything else. 
Describing his journey from Portsmouth to 
London, he said, with much liveliness of imagina- 
tion, that he had been put into a little house 
which horses ran away with. Wlien he was 
taken to see Lunardi ascend in his balloon, he 
said it was a ridiculous mode of travelling, as it 
could be done so much easier in a coach. He 
said also, on another occasion, that he preferred 
riding in a coach to every other conveyance, as it 
allowed people, he said, an opportunity of talking 
together. This brings us back to one of the 
leading indictments of the car — its unsociabilitj^ 
To talk with the driver, at any rate, is impossible ; 
and conversation in the tonneau is no pleasure. 
Nicholas Nickleby, it will be remembered, talked 
220 



Old Coachmen 

practically all the way from London to Yorkshire 
on a freezing winter night. I recently made a 
similar night journey in a racing-car with only 
the two front seats_, and we said never a word^ 
the driver and I — or if he spoke I did not hear 
it — jbetween 2 o'clock and 9. Had he been 
Mr. Weller^ now^ or William of Yuba^ or old 
Hine of the Brighton coach^ father of the best 
painter the South Downs have had (with the 
possible exception of Copley Fielding in his 
exquisite water-colour picture at South Kensing- 
ton) and the hero of a very delightful old-world 
book^ called Round About a Brighton Coach Office, 
by another descendant — had he instead been 
one of these ripe characters with four loyal horses 
tugging at his arms and beating out the music 
of the hoofs, how delightful it would have 
been ! Or Mr. Wise^ Nimrod's friend^ the hero 
of the Southampton Road, of whom Nimrod tells 
so good a story. On Mr. Wise's box one day 
climbed a young gentleman of his acquaintance, 
who had just entered the Church, and the 
following dialogue occurred : — 

Mr. Wise : " Well, Mr. John, so you be got 

into Orders." 

Young Divine : ^^ Why, yes, I am." 

Mr. Wise : ^^ All right ; I am glad to hear it, 

for they tells me that's not quite so easy a job 

Z2l 



On a Bookseller's Mistake 

as it used to be. Now_, I've known your father 
many years^ and have drove you many a mile^ 
and I want to ask you a bit of a favour : Will 
you be so good as to explain to me a little bit 
about that there Trinity ? " 

Young Divine ; ^^ Why^ that is not exactly a 
subject for a coach-box^ Wise^ and perhaps I 
might not make you comprehend it clearly 
without entering more fully into it/' 

Mr. Wise : '^ W^hy^ to tell you the truth^ sir^ 
I have thought a good deal myself about that 
there Trinity^ and never could understand it ; 
but I don't know how it is^ I never meets three 
in a gig that I don't think of it ! " 

One is no enemy of the car as a useful adjunct 
for twentieth-century utilitarianism and progress ; 
but for me that is its beginning and end. Con- 
venience is its only justification. I will keep 
business appointments in taxis_, and be driven 
to and from stations in the motor-cars of friends 
with perfect resignation ; but only from an 
incorrigible complaisance will I ever again go 
for what is called a run in a motor-car. They 
make me cold^ they make me blind^ they make 
me nervous (less for myself than for the people 
in the road)^ and they make me ashamed. They 
aggravate the insolence and success of the rich^ 
and they increase the failure (if it be failure) and 
lowliness of the poor. It gives me no satisfaction 
to dim with my dust the Sweet W^illiams and 

222 



William Hinton 

marigolds of the cottage gardens ; it does not 
interest or delight me in the least to see old 
countrymen starts and young children scatter in 
terror from their play. 

^^I Avonder^ reverend sir/' said the famous 
William Hinton to his vicar^ ^^ that you volun- 
tarily trust your perishable body to the outside 
of a vehicle of the soundness of which you know 
nothings and suffer yourself to be drawn to and 
fro by four strange animals of whose temper you 
are ignorant^ driven by a coachman of whose 
capacity and sobriety you are uninformed." 
None the less I intend to take a seat on Mr. 
Vanderbilt's coach just to go to Brighton in a 
gentlemanly way for once. I have never done 
it yet. Years ago I used often to see Jem Selby, 
and I saw him on the very day on which he won 
his bet by driving from London to Brighton and 
back under eight hours ; but I never rode with 
him. It was that drive^ they said, which killed 
him ; for he caught cold in the strain and excite- 
ment of it all — ^just as poor G. F. Grace was said 
to have received his death sentence as he waited 
on the ropes in a state of tense anxiety to catch 
Bonnor from one of the highest and longest hits 
ever made. 

Yet coaches^ I have heard it urged^ after 
dinner^ by motorists^ when this kind of argument 
223 



On a Bookseller's Mistake 

(utterly futile) is in progress — coaches made dust 
too^ and coaches often ran over people. True. 
But think for a moment of the habits of the 
coach : the coach passed but twice or four times 
a day^ regularly ; the coach gave a kindly musical 
notice of its approach ; the coach obeyed laws 
and was thoughtful. 

But of course there is no comparison^ and I 
should not be forcing one were it not for that 
wretched bookseller's catalogue. It is his fault. 



224 



Two Apologues <> ^> <> ^ ^ 

I. The Prince's Laugh 

/^NCE upon a time there lived a Prince who 
had everything calculated to make princes 
happy. 

His country had peace. His digestion was 
good. His horses were fliers. He had many 
favourites. He never did anything that he did 
not w^ant to_, and he exacted vast sums from his 
people to pay for his excesses and hobbies. 

But as he was very handsome and there were 
no w^ars^ the people always sang their national 
anthem quite as if they meant it^ and kept picture- 
postcards of him on the mantelpiece. 

But the Prince^ in spite of all his prosperity^ 
had one trouble — he could not laugh. 

Everything was done to make him laugh ; but 
in vain. The funniest men of his own and other 
countries were brought to perform their antics 
p 225 



Two Apologues 

before him. Fat men sat on new hats. In 
clespah- a punster was fetched. 

Still he did not laugh. He longed to laugh 
but could not. 

He went to all the funny plays and came away 
graver than before. He even tried musical 
comedy. 

They went to the length of bringing him a 
magistrate^ but it was useless. They brought a 
judge^ with the same barren result. 

Finally, by the advice of a cynic, they show ed 
him a poor author's face as he noted the dis- 
parity between his bankrupt publisher's estimate 
of what his business was worth and the sum that 
it really fetched ; but that left the Prince serious 
too. 

He never laughed ; and in course of time he 
died and was buried with great pomp. 

Some months later a magnificent monument 
was placed over the grave, bearing a long epitaph. 
The Prince's body, lying below, sent his soul up 
to see what had been written about him, and the 
soul committed it to memory and hurried back to 
recite it. 

When he was half-way through the Prince's 

mouth began to twitch. When he went on to the 

passage stating that his first thought had always 

been for his people's w^elfare, the Prince began to 

226 



The Fairy Godmothers 

chuckle ; when he came to the part about the 
Prince having the heart of a child^ the Prince 
began to laugh softly ; and at the end he was 
laughing out loud. 



II. The Christening of the Success 

The Baby lay in his little cot. He was to be 
christened that mornings and there was a great 
bustle of guests do\vnstairs ; two greengrocers 
were preparing the luncheon table. 

So many aunts and cousins had come in^ just 
to peep at the little pet^ that he had grown fret- 
ful^ and Nurse had locked the door and forbidden 
any one else to approach it. 

The blinds were down and the curtains of the 
cot were drawn^ and the Baby at last slept. 

Although Nurse had the key in her pockety 
the room suddenly filled with fairy godmothers. 
They had come by appointment^ and had each 
brought a gift. Every baby has them. 

All were there but one. Owing to some care- 
lessness on the part of the Baby's parents^ she had 
not received a card. 

'^^ He shall be a success/' said the Fairies in 
unison. ^^A success.'' 

^^ I give him/' said the Firsts '^ determination." 
227 



Two Apologues 

^^I give him/' said the Second^ ^^a clear head." 

^^ I give him/' said the Thirds ^^self-confidence." 

^^ I give him/' said the Fourth^ " indifference to 
public opinion." 

^^ I give him/' said the Fifth_, ^^a good memory 
for faces." 

^^And I give him/' said the Sixths ^^a know- 
ledge of men." 

^^ There/' said the First Fairy ^ with much 
complacency^ ^^ now I think we may go. Nothing 
can ever hurt our darling now. He has everything 
he needs. He can be anything he likes. There 
is no worldly prize out of his grasp. He can have 
motor-cars and yachts^ and sup at a restaurant 
every night. He can rule men^ and when he 
dies the Chancellor of the Exchequer will bless 
his memory." 

" Stay ! " cried a strange and angry voice ; and^ 
looking rounds they perceived the other Fairy in 
their midst. She w^as furious. 

"Why was I not told of the date t ' she cried. 
" I will punish them for this. I will undo all 
your work. Your gifts shall avail him nothing 
after he has received mine^ for I give him — — " 

" What ? " cried the others in terror. 

" I give him -" 

Consternation distorted every face* 
" I give him a sympathetic heart." 
228 



The Failure 

^^ Ah ! " wailed the First Fairy^ as she gathered 
up her skirts and prepared to leave ; ^^ he is 
ruined ! " 

The angry Fairy bent over the cot. ^^ I am 
glad I came/' she hissed. ^^ He will be a 
Failure now." 



229 



studies in Consolation 



M 



R. and Mrs. Linsey-Martell lived a life of 



disagreement. 



Mr. Linsey-Martell was a novelist in a modest 
but capable way. 

Mrs. Linsey-Martell did not dislike her 
husband^ and was annoyed when he was away^ 
but she took no interest in his work^ never 
read his novels^ and rarely mentioned him to her 
friends except in disparagement^ referring to him 
not exactly as a brute but an incubus. 

Mr. Linsey-Martell died. 

Mrs. Linsey-Martell was plunged in dismay ; 
yet the dressmaker's visit was not without ex- 
citement, and her mind dwelt more on the future 
than the past. 

The next day she was astonished by the 
arrival of two journalists within a few minutes of 
230 



Mrs. Linsey-Martell 

each other^ asking for details concerning Mr. 
Linsey-Martell's career^ which she suppUed in a 
colourless narrative. 

During the morning three similar applications 
were made^ and as she replied to them she 
began to be conscious of a new feeling con- 
cerning Mr. Linsey-Martell in which something 
like pride had a part. Emotion once interrupted 
her narrative. 

As Mrs. Linsey-Martell read the notices in the 
papers the next day^ she realised that it was an 
interesting thing to be the widow of a great 
writer. Her heart beat. 

From an article in a weekly paper Mrs. Linsey- 
Martell learned a number of adjectives to apply 
to her husband's works. 

Mrs. Linsey-Martell had all Mr. Linsey-Martell's 
books bound in morocco^ richly tooled^ and a 
little bookcase made specially for them. 

Mrs. Linsey-Martell thinks nothing of any 
other author. 

II 

As the body of William Smith was leaving the 
cemetery chapel on its way to the grave^ an 
elderly gentleman of aristocratic mien alighted 
231 



Studies in Consolation 

from an electric brougham^ and after a word with 
an official joined the little band of mourners. 

William Smith was moving more slowly than 
he ever had done in life^ for he had been a 
commercial traveller noted for his briskness until 
double pneumonia set in. 

Mrs. Smith had seen her husband infrequently^ 
and then only for brief week-ends^ but she 
respected him deeply^ was grateful for the 
position to which he had raised her^ and^ 
weeping steadily now at the graveside^ had 
accepted grief as her destiny. 

The ceremony over^ the stranger approached 
Mrs. Smith in an attitude of sympathetic 
courtesy^ and offered her his arm to the gate. 
He told her how highly he had always valued 
her husband^ how completely they had understood 
each other_, and how different everything had 
been since they parted. 

The widow listened with respect and satisfac- 
tion^ in no way embarrassed by her ignorance of 
the gentleman's name^ for her husband naturally 
had had many friends unknown to herself, 
although this one certainly seemed to be_, both in 
attire and in address^ far removed above her idea 
of the majorit}^ of them^ several of whom were 
indeed present. 

■^^If there is anything I can do^ Mrs. Smith/' 
232 



Mrs. William Smith 

said the stranger^ as he shook her hand at the 
gates_, ^^ you must write to me. You will see that 
I have moved to another town house_," and handing 
her his card^ he lifted his hat with a gesture 
of reverent courtesy^ stepped into his brougham^ 
and was driven away. 

The widow looked at the card^ and reeled. 
It was that of the Earl of Borrodaile. 

One by one, as the high tea progressed^ 
anecdotes of the Earl of Borrodaile came to the 
memory of this guest and that — his wealthy his 
career^ his wild oats^ his famous or infamous 
ancestry^ but most of all, recurring and recurring, 
his perfect manners, the unmistakable affability 
of your true nobleman, as compared with the 
supercilious condescension of the spurious political 
or new^spaper breed, with a word for the modesty 
(or craftiness) of the deceased in keeping so dis- 
tinguished a friendship a secret from his older pals. 

The next day one of the guests sent the widow^ 
not only a cabinet photograph of the earl but 
also his caricature, by no means unkindly done, 
from Vanity Fair. These pictures, one in the 
parlour framed in gilt, and one in Mrs. Smith's 
bedroom in plush, may now be seen, with the 
widow often before them, pointing them out to her 
friends and callers, with suitable memories not only 
of the peer himself but of his intimacy with her 
233 



Studies in Consolation 

husband : except for a shining drop of pride 
perfectly the mistress of herself, serene in anec- 
dotage. For by the infinite goodness of God she 
has never learned that the Earl of Borrodaile was 
under the impression that he was consoling the 
widow of William Smith_, his old pensioned valet, 
whose funeral had been in progress only a few 
yards distant at the same time. 



234 



The Cut-Glass Bowl <> 



I 



Miss Norman-Crnidge^ of 72a Kensington Palace 
Terrace, to her newly - married niece , Mrs. 
Livesei/j ^^ Rosemoimt," Warwick 

April 17, 190— 
My dear Sarah, — I am not^ as you know^ by 
any means satisfied with your marriage, which I 
consider both imprudent and perilous. Mr. 
Livesey is not at all the husband I should have 
chosen for you myself. He is a weak although 
doubtless amiable man^ whereas what you wanted 
was some one capable of correcting your foibles. 
He is also^ I understand, a Radical and a vege- 
tarian^ and probably an Agnostic_, and is there- 
fore not in the least calculated to direct your 
mind as those who really love you would wish. 
However^ since there is no use now in saying any 
23s 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

more^ I have decided henceforward to consider 
him as one of the family (although I hope that 
when you come here to stay you will let me know 
exactly what he can eat and what he cannot) and 
cease to criticise ; and it is with much pleasure 
that I am sending you a piece of old glass from 
my own collection for your table as a memento of 
my wishes for your happiness. — Your affectionate 

Aunt Mercy 

II 

Mi's. Livesey to Mrs. Vansiitartj of^^heeside^' Kains 
Roady Edinburgh 

April 18, 190— 

My dearest Mother^ — I implore you to tell 
me what to do. Aunt Mercy having forgiven 
us, sent me, yesterday, a very beautiful cut-glass 
bowl, which unhappily came smashed to atoms. 
What am I to do ? Shall I tell her the awful 
truth that it is broken, or shall I simply say 
^^ thank you " ? It seems so dreadful to have to 
tell her it is broken just after she has wTitten 
such a letter ; but if I don't there is always the 
chance that she may come to see us and ask for 
it. Do advise me. — Your loving S. 



236 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

III 

Mrs. Vansittart to Mrs. Livesey 

April 19, 190— 
My darling Child^ — Your letter came by the 
last post and I have not had a wink of sleep 
thinking about this terrible dilemma. Of course 
we ought always to tell the truths but your Aunt 
will be so vexed^ and just after she had come 
round too. On the other hand she is sure to 
find it out if you depart from the truths because 
no one has ever taken her in. She has been like 
that ever since we were girls. I think you must 
be brave, dear^ and say that it came broken^ but 
doubtless owing to a fall in the Post Office and 
not at all because it was carelessly packed. Yes^ 
I think that is best. — Your loving perplexed 

Mother 

IV 

Mrs. Livesey to Miss Norman-Crudge 

April 20, 190— 
My dear Aunt Mercy^ — How very kind of 
you ! What a beautiful bowl ! But I am ex- 
ceedingly sorry to say that when we unpacked 
it it was found to be broken all to pieces. The 
237 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

packing was perfect^ so it must have been the 
result of a fall on the way. We are greatly dis- 
appointed and distressed^ and I am wondering if 
you can tell me where I could buy another like 
it. — Your affectionate niece^ Sarah Livesey 

P.S. — Joseph^ who spent hours last night putting 
the pieces together^ and who joins with me in 
love and gratitude, says he never saw a more 
beautiful bowl. 



Miss Norman-Criidge to Mrs. Vansittart 

April 21, 190— 
Dear Rhoda, — A most unfortunate thing has 
happened. I w^ent to some self-sacrifice over my 
wedding present for Sarah — my motto being 
that it is absurd to cry over spilt milk, and now 
that she has definitely taken that very unpleasant 
man for her husband it is the duty of us all to 
make the best of it. It was one of my choicest 
cut-glass bowls and of very unusual design. It 
left this house in perfect condition, very carefully 
packed by Yates ; but Sarah tells me that when 
it arrived it was in fragments. Under the cir- 
cumstances, especially considering how dis- 
appointed we all liad been by this marriage, I 
238 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

think that had I been Sarah I should have held 
my tongue and merely have said thank you^ 
leaving me in ignorance as to the catastrophe. 
But she has been very oddly brought up, and 
that nice thought for other people's feelings 
w^hich our dear mother did so much to teach 
you and me is no longer in fashion. I am, how- 
ever, sending them another bowl, as I should 
not like them to be without any memento of 
me. — ;Your loving sister, Mercy 



VI 



Mrs. Livesei/ to Mrs. Vansittart 



April 25, 190— 

My darling Mother, — What is to be done ? 
I am so sorry to trouble you again, but you know 
Aunt Mercy so much better than I do. She very 
kindly sent another glass bowl, but by really 
extraordinary bad luck, that one came broken 
too. There seems to be a fatality about it. 
What can I say to her this time } How can I 
tell her such an awful truth twice running ? 
Joseph says that it is old glass and cannot be 
matched ; but don't you think he had better 
try ? Do tell me. — Your loving S. 

239 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

VII 
Mrs. Vansittart to Mrs Livesey 

April 26, 190— 
My darling Child^ — I am all unstrung by 
the new calamity; but I don't think you need 
hesitate this time. I should just write to thank 
your aunt and make no reference to the bowl's 
being broken at all. I say this^ because she 
wrote me a letter rather complaining that you 
had told her the first time. She seems to think 
it would have been kinder to her not to. I was 
troubled when I got that letter^ but now I am 
relieved^ for it makes our duty clear. I do so 
hope Joseph will be successful in his search ; but 
I fear the worst. — Your loving Mother 

P.S. — Of course it will be dreadful if Joseph 
cannot match it and your Aunt Mercy comes to 
see you. You will have to tell the truth then, 
I suppose ; but it will be easier after some time 
has elapsed than now so soon after the other. 
We must hope for the best. 

VIII 

Mrs. Livesey to Miss Norma7i-Crudge 

April 27, 190— 
My dear Aunt Mercy,^ — You are more than 
kind to send another bowl. I can't think where 

240 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

you find such beautiful things. Joseph is in 
raptures over your taste. We shall never forget 
your kindness. — Your aifectionate niece^ 

Sarah Livesey 
IX 

Miss Nonnan-Crudge to Mrs. Livesey 

May 24, 190— 
My dear Sarah, — I am now able, I find, owing 
to the illness of my old friend Miss Vyner, who 
was to have come here for a fortnight, but now 
cannot, to pay you the visit which I have long 
promised myself. I could come on Monday next 
by the train which reaches Warwick at 5.48, and 
stay till Friday quite comfortably. This will give 
me time to get to know your husband, and, I trust, 
to esteem him. I should like to have Yates with 
me, but can doubtless manage without her if you 
have any lack of room. I am a very easy guest, 
as I always bring my own tea and shall arrange 

for bread by post. — Your loving 

Aunt Mercy 



Mrs. Livesey to Mrs. Vansittart 

May 25, 190— 
My darling Mother, — A dreadful thing has 
happened. Aunt Mercy has written to say she 

Q 241 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

wants to come from Monday to Friday of next 
week to see us and get to like Joseph. The 
terrible thing is the glass bowl^ because poor 
Joseph has never been able to match it^ chiefly 
on account of the smallness of the bits^ which 
we kept^ but which the glass people cannot 
manage to put together satisfactorily. I am 
not at all strong just now^ and the prospect of 
having to face Aunt Mercy and tell her about 
the bowl is too dreadful. What shall I do ? 
Is it safe to tell her we cannot have her ? 
Please telegraph. — Your loving S. 

XI 

Mrs, Vansiitart to Mrs. Livesey 
{Tele grant) 

May 26, 1 go- 
Sympathise very deeply. Better ask aunt 
postpone visit. — Mother 

XII 
Mrs. Livesei/ to Miss Norman-Crudge 

May 26, 190— 
My dear Aunt Mercy^ — I am so very sorry^ 
as it would have been a great pleasure to have 

242 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

you here under our roof, but both Joseph and 
the doctor think I am not quite strong enough 
for a visitor just now. Not that I am at all ill^ 
but I have been rather run down and I might 
not be able to look after you and take you 
about as I should wish. So^ dear Aunt Mercy, 
I hope you won't mind postponing your visit 
for a little while. — Your affectionate niece^ 

Sarah 

XIII 
Miss' Norma?i-Crudge to Mrs. Livesey 

May 27, 190— 

My dear Sarah, — I am sorry to hear of your 
poor health, but you must not think that the 
fear of being left too much to myself will deter 
me from my project of seeing you and your 
husband — with perhaps a peep at the bowl in its 
proud position ! It will interest me to explore 
Warwick alone, and I shall be glad also to do 
what I can to nurse and amuse you. The only 
difference it will make is that I shall now 
certainly bring Yates, as she is so clever witli 
beef-tea and jelUes, and is a perfect nurse. — 
Your affectionate Aunt Mercy 



H3 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

XIV 

Mrs, Livesej/ to Mrs. Vansittari 

May 28, 190— 
My dear Mother, — It is no good, as the 
enclosed letter will show you. Joseph, who is 
furious, wants me to write again and say it is 
something catching ; but Aunt Mercy would be 
sure to find out. I am taking a strong tonic and 
preparing for the worst. — Your loving S. 

XV 

Jane Yates to Mrs. hivesey 

May 30, 1,90— 

(Telegravi) 

Miss Norman-Crudge in bed with influenza. 
Visit must be postponed. — Yates 

XVI 
Mrs. Lives ey to Mrs, Vansittart 

May 30, 190— 

My darling Mother, — I am nearly off my 
head with joy. She is not coming, Yates has 
244 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

telegraphed that Aunt Mercy is in bed with 
influenza. Joseph was so excited that he insisted 
on my having some champagne for lunch^ although 
of course not joining me. I don't seem to mind 
anything now^ although I suppose it will all 
begin over again. — Your loving S. 

XVII 

Miss Norman-Crudge to Mrs. Livesey 

July 15, 190— 
My dear Sarah, — I want you to be so good as 
to do me a little service. There is to be a bazaar 
here next w eek in connection with the new organ 
for St. Michael's, and as I want it to be a great 
success I have undertaken to arrange a small but 
tasteful exhibition of old china and glass and 
perhaps a little choice furniture in one of the 
smaller rooms. The bowl which I gave you for 
a wedding present is so excellent a specimen 
of its style and period (although inferior to the 
one which you said arrived broken) that I should 
like to include it. The bazaar lasts only three 
days, so that you would not be deprived of your 
treasure for more than a week altogether. I 
enclose a postal order for half a crown to defray 
the cost of transit and professional pacMng. — Your 
affectionate Aunt Mercy 

245 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

XVIII 

Mrs. Livesey to Mrs. Vansittart 

July 17, 190— 
My darling Mother^ — It is all over now. I 
have told Aunt Mercy that the bowl is broken. 
I had to do it, because she wrote asking to borrow 
it for an exhibition. Joseph would not let me 
worry about it any more. He said there had 
been trouble enough about the wretched thing 
and he would settle the matter once for all ; and 
this is what he helped me to write. I send it to 
you in case you see Aunt Mercy and she asks you 
any questions : — 

" Dearest Aunt Mercy, — I am very sorry that 
I cannot send you the bowl, because unhappily it 
no longer exists. It is broken ; and by a curious 
chance it happened on the very day that your 
visit to us, to which we were looking forward so 
keenly, was postponed. (^This is a dreadful 
story, dear mother, hid I seem to have been telling 
nothing else for years?) At the time that Yates's 
kind telegram was brought saying you were ill in 
bed and could not come to us after all, Joseph 
was carrying the bowl up to my bedroom with 
fresh roses in it, as we always made a point of 
246 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

never letting the parlourmaid touch it. {This 
about Hie loarlourmaid is literallij true, dear Mother, 
although it sounds like another /) As both his 
hands were full he told Mills to open the telegram 
and read it to him_, which she did^ and no sooner 
did he hear the sad news than the bowl slipped 
out of his hands and was utterly smashed. We 
have the pieces stilly but the mending people say 
it is impossible to put them together again. I 
hoped that I should not have to tell you^ dear 
Aunt Mercy^ but perhaps it is better to have 
done so. One does not like to deceive^ even out 
of consideration for another's feelings. Both 
Joseph^ who is naturally very unhappy about it^ 
and I hope that you will not think it necessary 
to give us another present. — With much love^ I 
remain^ your affectionate niece^ Sarah'' 

There^ dear Mother, I think that that must be 
the end anyway, whatever happens. I will tell 
you what Aunt Mercy says. Do come and see us 
soon, dear. — Your loving S. 

XIX 

Miss Norman-Crudge to Mrs. Livesey 

July 18, 190— 
My dear Sarah, — I am of course very sorry 
to think that both my beautiful bowls have 

247 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

ceased to be^ but the very natural circumstances 
of the destruction of the second one help to 
reconcile me. Poor Joseph^ I do not wonder he 
was upset. I shall not make the experiment of 
giving 3^ou glass again^ but I hope to see some- 
thing more durable when next I visit my old 
furniture dealer. The exhibition^ you will be 
glad to hear^ promises to be a great success^ even 
without the bowl. — Your affectionate^ 

Aunt Mercy 



XX 

Mrs, Vansittart to Mrs. Lwcsey\ 

July 20, 190— 

My darling Sarah^ — I was so glad to get 
your letter^ with your Aunt Mercy's enclosed^ 
and to feel that everything is now all right 
again. It shows how important it is to tell the 
truth^ for until she knew it was broken there 
was no peace of mind for any of us. I am sure 
I have suffered almost as much as you. My 
one fear is that when I meet your aunt when 
she pays her annual visit to Scotland next month 
1 shall forget what happened;, and that might 
248 



The Cut-Glass Bowl 

be terrible. I can't help feeling it will be safer 
if I know nothing about it at all. Yes, that is 
best. — Your loving Mother 

P.S. — I reopen this to say, remember, darling, 
I know nothing about it at all. 



249 



The Collector <'^ ^> <s> ^ <:> 

A MAN was sitting in his library before the 
fire,, looking at nothing. He was a rich 
man^ and had all that happy people are supposed 
by the less happy to want. Above all he had 
perfect taste. His pictures in particular were 
wonderful : he never made a mistake. 

There came a knock at the door^ and the 
servant entered to say that a small packing-case 
had just arrived^ and what was to be done with it. 
^^ Bring it here/' said his master^ ^^and bring a 
hammer and screw-driver." 

The box was brought in and opened : it con- 
tained a picture which the connoisseur had 
bought the day before at Christie's^ after a 
hard struggle and at an enormous figure — 
a small w^oodland scene by an exquisite master^ 
so tender and quiet and true that even 
unthinking persons who saw it became for the 
moment hushed and gentle^ and sensitive persons 
250 



The Collector 

almost trembled, while artists waved their thumbs 
at it with murmurs of amazement and despair. 

The man set the picture on a chair in a good 
light and studied it and studied it. 

After a few minutes he rose and went to a 
cabinet, from a drawer of which he took a large 
flat parcel. Returning to his seat before the fire, 
he drew from the paper an oleograph, represent- 
ing a sunset, framed atrociously in gilt and as crude 
and garish as if it had been coloured with orange- 
peel and sealing-wax. It was the first picture 
he had ever bought, the foundation-stone of his 
collection. He had saved up for it when he 
was only ten, and for some years it had hung in 
his bedroom and rejoiced him night and morning. 

As he looked at it now his eyes filled with 
tears. 



251 



Printed by 

Morrison & Gibb Limited 

Edinhurgh 



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